Marathon Viewing The Latest Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

It is the season to lounge on the couch and demolish a packet of mince pies in front of a good movie, a poor film, or one that’s terrible yet terrific.

As always, a selection of fresh holiday movies hopes to be part of our festive viewing—perhaps even joining the ranks alongside timeless staples like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

Therefore, in a noble effort to separate the winners from the losers, and to get into the festive feeling, I watched as many fresh holiday releases as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Kicking off, ideally, on a good foot. This is the only 2025 movie on a well-known aggregator's list of the top 100 holiday films of all time.

The Jonas Brothers end up trapped in the UK after finishing their international trek and must make it back for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who sings to declare they won’t get home until they “rediscover their brotherly magic.”

The banter between the bickering brothers is amusing even for the uninitiated, while fans will no doubt pick up on lots of easter eggs as they attempt to get back using all transportation available.

It’s a journey of epic proportions.

It’s not legendary, but is excellent for devotees and a solid start to the day.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their relatives who are obliged to sit through it.

8.45am - Tinsel Town

Hollywood star Kiefer Sutherland appears as a celebrity roped into a pantomime.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “difficult” and ageing action hero Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose representative has tricked him into thinking he’s performing in prestigious English theatre.

His Aladdin cast-mates tell him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he protests. You can guess their response. Unless you’re not acquainted with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some very funny lines, some heartwarming sub-plots, and the rest of the cast is brilliant, too.

It’s the kind of movie that would be a bit naff at another season, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

10.19am - Christmas Karma

An actor appears at the beginning of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the next movie straight. Might this become a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a singing black cab driver who picks up Mr Sood, the modern take on Mr Scrooge from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

Mr Sood is played by an actor from Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by the director of Gurinder Chadha. The familiar story progresses as the tight-fisted Mr Sood is confronted by the apparitions of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least distinct from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s acting is lifeless—a problem when he’s so the focal point.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

There’s time for a major broadcaster's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “avoids Christmas.”

But after he gets an large festive windfall at work, his wife (played by Morgana Robinson) talks him into splurging the cash on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one snag—he finds out there was an mistake 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 background—Christmas is the scene of the film rather than its main point—but it feels cosy and festive all the same.

Driven corporate star 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 guy in a bookshop who promises to show her a festive Paris.

A commentator recently claimed this is the best new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a overstatement, but it is a holiday love story with a hint of sophistication and gives the required heartwarming sensation.

The scene with a lengthy discussion about Die Hard is notable too.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

Young Chris, played by Lenny Rush, holds onto his belief in Father Christmas, despite the attempts of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him otherwise.

The answer is out there, and Chris embarks on a quest to find it with the expert help of a panel of well-known experts and celebrities.

It’s low-key but sweet, and good viewing while expecting Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a bickering American family who reunite for the holidays—including other Oscar nominee Felicity Jones, Chloe Grace Moretz, Jason Schwartzman, and dad Denis Leary.

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

So that’s the premise, but in reality it’s really a combination of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character finally finds her strength.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s waned in quality, but thankfully here’s a new offering in the crowded field of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and utterly watchable—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a narrative as old as time: An American woman goes on a quest to a far-off wintery locale and ends up discovering romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher