Devouring This Year's Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

It is the time of year to lounge on the sofa and devour a tin of holiday pastries in front of a good movie, a awful feature, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

Once again, a crop of new holiday movies hopes to be part of our seasonal watchlist—perhaps even joining the ranks alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

So, in a vital public service to separate the winners from the losers, and to get into the Christmas spirit, I marathoned as many new festive movies as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, hopefully, on a good foot. This film is the sole 2025 movie on a popular review site's list of the top 100 holiday films of all time.

The musical trio are trapped in the UK after finishing their global concert series and must make it back for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an villainous Saint Nick, who bursts into melody to declare they won’t get home until they “find their familial spark.”

The banter between the bickering brothers is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while devotees will no doubt pick up on lots of references as they endeavor to get back using all transportation available.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

It’s not an all-time classic, but is great for devotees and a good start to the day.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their family members who will have to sit through it.

Late Morning: Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland appears as a celebrity tricked into a "panto".

“A panto-what?” asks Sutherland’s “difficult” and aging action hero Brad Mack, who has seen better days and whose agent has tricked him into thinking he’s performing in renowned British drama.

His pantomime co-stars let him know he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he retorts. You can guess their reply. That is, unless you’re not acquainted with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some very funny lines, some cockle-warming side stories, and the supporting actors is brilliant, too.

It’s the sort of feature that would be a bit tacky at any other time of year, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

10.19am - Christmas Karma

A familiar face pops up at the start of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the second consecutive movie. Could this be a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who collects Mr Sood, the modern take on Mr Scrooge from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

Mr Sood is played by a star of Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The classic narrative unfolds as the miserly Mr Sood is confronted by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This South Asian reinterpretation is at least distinct from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s acting is wooden—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

Before lunch for a major broadcaster's holiday special—which stars Guz Khan as a endearingly grumpy man who “isn't big on Christmas.”

But after he receives an sizable holiday payout at work, his wife (portrayed by Morgana Robinson) convinces him spending the sum on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one snag—he finds out there was an error with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to determine how to reimburse the difference.

Pleasant yet unmemorable.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Early Afternoon: Champagne Problems

This is one of those Christmas films where the festive trappings are in the backdrop—Christmas is the environment of the film rather than its main point—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

High-powered businesswoman Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a French chateau to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. During her travels, she runs into a man in a book store who promises to show her the holidays in the City of Light.

An expert recently declared this is the top new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a Christmas romance with a touch of class and gives the obligatory heartwarming sensation.

The scene with a detailed conversation about Die Hard is very good too.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

Young Chris, played by Lenny Rush, continues to believe in Father Christmas, despite the persuasion of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him the truth.

The answer is somewhere, and Chris sets out to find it with the guidance of a team of well-known scientists and personalities.

It’s understated but charming, and ideal viewing while waiting for Santa to visit.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the head of a quarrelling American family who reunite for the holidays—including fellow acclaimed actress Felicity Jones, Chloe Grace Moretz, Jason Schwartzman, and dad Denis Leary.

Pfeiffer begins by referencing holiday staples like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before stating: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s what this is, but in reality it’s really a jumble of those forerunner films, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually comes into her own.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Evening: A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s taken a dip, but fortunately here’s a new addition in the packed genre of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and strangely compelling—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a story as old as time: An American woman travels to a distant snowy land and ends up finding romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher