Binge-Watching The Latest Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

It is the season to relax on the couch and demolish a box of mince pies in front of a good movie, a bad movie, or one that’s terrible yet terrific.

Once again, a batch of fresh Christmas films hopes to be part of our festive viewing—potentially even finding a spot alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

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

7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, hopefully, on a positive note. This film is the exclusive 2025 movie on a popular review site's list of the best 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The musical trio are stranded in the UK after concluding their world tour and must return for Christmas. Their efforts are thwarted by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to state they won’t get home until they “rediscover their sibling bond.”

The back-and-forth between the bickering brothers is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while fans will certainly catch lots of references as they attempt to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

It’s not legendary, but is great 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.

Late Morning: Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a celebrity roped into a "panto".

“A what's a panto??” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and older action hero Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose agent has deceived him into thinking he’s performing in prestigious English theatre.

His pantomime co-stars inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he retorts. One can imagine their response. Unless you’re ignorant of traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some great jokes, some heartwarming side stories, and the ensemble is cracking, too.

It’s the sort of feature that would be a bit cheesy at another season, but is a highly enjoyable at Christmas.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

An actor pops up at the outset of this film, too, insulting someone for the second film in a row. Could this be a budding festive ritual?

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

Mr Sood is played by The Big Bang Theory’s Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale develops as the tight-fisted Mr Sood is haunted by the apparitions of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This Indian Scrooge is at least different from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very captivating and Nayyar’s performance is wooden—a significant issue when he’s so the main character.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

There's just enough time for a major broadcaster's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “isn't big on Christmas.”

But after he gets an £8,000 Christmas bonus at work, his wife (portrayed by Morgana Robinson) persuades him blowing the money on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one snag—he learns there was an error with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to devise a plan for how to reimburse the difference.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Early Afternoon: 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 main point—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

Ambitious executive Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is sent to a country estate to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. En route, she encounters a man in a book store who offers to show her a festive Paris.

An expert recently declared this is the finest new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a holiday love story with a touch of class and gives the necessary warm and fuzzy feels.

The scene with a extended debate about Die Hard is particularly strong too.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

Sixteen-year-old Chris, played by Lenny Rush, refuses to stop believing in Father Christmas, in spite of the attempts of his dad (starring James Buckley) to tell him the truth.

The answer is to be discovered, and Chris embarks on a quest to find it with the expert help of a panel of well-known figures.

It’s understated but charming, and good viewing while anticipating Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

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

Pfeiffer begins by referencing 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 what this is, but in execution it’s really a jumble of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character at last finds her strength.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Evening: A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s waned in quality, but fortunately here’s a new addition in the saturated market of predictable, sentimental, cheesy—and highly entertaining—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 stumbling across romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher