Devouring 2025's Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

‘Tis the season to lounge on the sofa and consume a packet of holiday pastries in front of a good movie, a awful feature, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

Once again, a batch of new seasonal stories hopes to be part of our festive viewing—maybe even finding a spot alongside timeless staples like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (no arguments).

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

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Starting, optimistically, on a good foot. This is the only 2025 title on a well-known aggregator's list of the greatest 100 holiday films of all time.

The Jonas Brothers are stuck in the UK after finishing their world tour and must get home for Christmas. Their efforts are hindered by an villainous Saint Nick, who bursts into melody to announce they won’t get home until they “find their sibling bond.”

The banter between the bickering brothers is entertaining even for the non-fan, while followers will undoubtedly pick up on lots of in-jokes as they attempt to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

It’s not a timeless masterpiece, but is excellent for fans and a good start to the day.

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

8.45am - Tinsel Town

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

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and aging star Brad Mack, who has seen better days and whose representative has deceived him into thinking he’s appearing in prestigious English theatre.

His pantomime cast-mates let him know he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he insists angrily. It's easy to predict their retort. Except if you’re unfamiliar with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some great jokes, some heartwarming storylines, and the rest of the cast is brilliant, too.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

Danny Dyer shows up at the start of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the second film in a row. Is this a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a musical taxi operator who picks up Mr Sood, the latest spin 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 the director of Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale unfolds as the miserly Mr Sood is haunted by the ghosts of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least unique from all the others, but regrettably he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s portrayal is wooden—a major flaw when he’s so the main character.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

There's just enough time for a network's holiday special—which stars Guz Khan as a lovably grouchy guy who “isn't big on Christmas.”

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

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

Enjoyable but forgettable.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

1.12pm - Champagne Problems

This is one of those Christmas films where the tree, fairy lights and snow are in the setting—Christmas is the scene of the film rather than its core purpose—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

Ambitious executive Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a vineyard to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. En route, she encounters a fellow in a book store who vows to show her Christmas in Paris.

A commentator recently stated this is the finest new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a overstatement, but it is a Christmas romance with a dash of elegance and gives the necessary warm and fuzzy feels.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

A Charming Quest

Teenage 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 reality.

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

It’s gentle but sweet, and good viewing while anticipating Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

4.39pm - Oh. What. Fun.

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

Pfeiffer opens by name-dropping holiday staples 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 execution it’s really a mash-up of those inspirations, at least until Pfeiffer’s character finally comes into her own.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s taken a dip, but fortunately here’s a new offering in the crowded field of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and strangely compelling—festive fodder.

It’s a story as well-worn: An American woman journeys to a distant snowy land and ends up discovering romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher