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

‘Tis the season to slob out on the couch and demolish a box of mince pies in front of a great film, a bad movie, or one that’s awesomely awful.

Once again, a batch of new holiday movies aims to become part of our festive viewing—potentially even finding a spot alongside timeless staples like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

So, in a noble effort to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to get into the festive feeling, I marathoned as many fresh festive movies as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Kicking off, ideally, on a high. This film is the exclusive 2025 entry on a popular review site's list of the greatest 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The Jonas Brothers are stuck in the UK after concluding their international trek and must return for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an evil Santa, who bursts into melody to announce they won’t get home until they “rediscover their familial spark.”

The repartee between the arguing trio is amusing even for the non-fan, while fans will certainly pick up on lots of references as they attempt to get back using any means of transport necessary.

It’s a journey of epic proportions.

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

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

Late Morning: Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a Hollywood star tricked into a traditional British stage show.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and aging star Brad Mack, who has seen better days and whose manager has deceived him into thinking he’s performing in renowned British drama.

His Aladdin fellow actors let him know he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he retorts. One can imagine their retort. That is, unless you’re not acquainted with traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some hilarious moments, some cockle-warming storylines, and the supporting actors is cracking, too.

It’s the kind of movie that would be a bit cheesy at a different time, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

A familiar face pops up at the start of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the second consecutive movie. Could this be a budding festive ritual?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who encounters Mr Sood, the newest interpretation 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 Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The familiar story develops as the miserly Mr Sood is visited 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 different from all the others, but regrettably he’s not very captivating and Nayyar’s performance is lifeless—a significant issue when he’s so central to everything.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

Before lunch for a network's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “doesn’t really do Christmas.”

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

There’s just one problem—he finds out there was an mistake with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to devise a plan for how to return the difference.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

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 cosy and festive all the same.

Driven corporate star Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is sent to a country estate to secure an acquisition for a champagne business. During her travels, she meets a man in a literary haven who offers to show her Christmas in Paris.

A commentator recently declared this is the finest new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a overstatement, but it is a festive dalliance with a hint of sophistication and gives the required cozy feelings.

The scene with a detailed conversation about Die Hard is particularly strong too.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

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

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

It’s understated but sweet, and good viewing while expecting Santa to visit.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

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

Pfeiffer opens by name-dropping Christmas classics like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before saying: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the premise, but in execution it’s really a mash-up of those inspirations, at least until Pfeiffer’s character at last finds her strength.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s gone downhill, but fortunately here’s a new offering in the saturated market of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and strangely compelling—holiday fare.

It’s a story as familiar as can be: An American woman travels to a distant snowy land and ends up discovering romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher