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

‘Tis the season to lounge on the couch and consume a packet of festive treats in front of a terrific flick, a awful feature, or one that’s awesomely awful.

As always, a batch of fresh holiday movies aims to become part of our festive viewing—perhaps even earning a place alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

Thus, in a vital public service to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to embrace the Christmas spirit, I watched as many recent holiday releases as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, ideally, on a high. This is the sole 2025 movie on a famous website's list of the top 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The musical trio are stranded in the UK after finishing their world tour and must make it back for Christmas. Their attempts are thwarted by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to state they won’t get home until they “rekindle their familial spark.”

The back-and-forth between the bickering brothers is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while devotees will no doubt catch lots of in-jokes as they try to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s private planes, trains and automobiles.

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

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

Next: A Star in Panto

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a movie actor tricked into a pantomime.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and aging action hero Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose representative has tricked him into thinking he’s performing in high-class London stage.

His pantomime cast-mates inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Oh no I’m not,” he insists angrily. You can guess their reply. That is, unless you’re not acquainted with traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some very funny lines, some cockle-warming side stories, and the rest of the cast is excellent, too.

It’s the kind of movie that would be a bit naff at a different time, but is a lot of fun at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

A familiar face shows up at the beginning of this film, too, insulting someone for the second consecutive movie. Is this a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a musical taxi operator 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 filmmaker behind Gurinder Chadha. The classic narrative develops as the miserly Mr Sood is visited by the apparitions of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least unique from all the others, but sadly he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s performance is wooden—a major flaw when he’s so the focal point.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

12.04pm - Stuffed

There’s time for a network's holiday special—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “isn't big on Christmas.”

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

There’s just one issue—he discovers there was an mix-up with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to figure out how to pay back the excess.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

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

High-powered businesswoman Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a French chateau to secure an acquisition for a champagne business. During her travels, she meets a fellow in a book store who offers to show her a festive Paris.

A critic recently stated this is the finest new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a festive dalliance with a touch of class and gives the obligatory cozy feelings.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

A Charming Quest

Sixteen-year-old Chris, played by Lenny Rush, holds onto his belief in Father Christmas, in spite of the efforts of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him the truth.

The secret is out there, and Chris ventures forth to find it with the guidance of a panel of well-known scientists and personalities.

It’s gentle but endearing, and good viewing while expecting Santa to visit.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

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

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

So that’s what this is, but in practice it’s really a combination of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character at last takes center stage.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Evening: A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s waned in quality, but fortunately here’s a new entry in the crowded field of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and utterly watchable—festive fodder.

It’s a narrative as old as time: An American woman journeys to a picturesque cold country and ends up stumbling across romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher