Binge-Watching 2025's Festive Features: The Hits, The Misses, and The Guilty Pleasures.

It is the time of year to relax on the couch and consume a box of holiday pastries in front of a great film, a awful feature, or one that’s terrible yet terrific.

Once again, a batch of fresh Christmas films aims to become part of our seasonal watchlist—potentially even earning a place alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

Thus, in a noble effort to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to embrace the Christmas spirit, I watched as many new Christmas films as possible in a single day.

First Up: The Jonas Brothers' Holiday Flick

Starting, hopefully, on a good foot. This film is the only 2025 title on a well-known aggregator's list of the top 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The Jonas Brothers are trapped in the UK after concluding their global concert series and must make it back for Christmas. Their attempts are hindered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to declare they won’t get home until they “rekindle their brotherly magic.”

The repartee between the bickering brothers is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while followers will undoubtedly notice lots of in-jokes as they attempt to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a journey of epic proportions.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their family members who must sit through it.

8.45am - Tinsel Town

Hollywood star Kiefer Sutherland stars as a Hollywood star cast a pantomime.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and older action hero Brad Mack, who has seen better days and whose agent has tricked him into thinking he’s starring in prestigious English theatre.

His Aladdin fellow actors tell him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he protests. It's easy to predict their reply. Unless you’re ignorant of traditional stage call-and-response.

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

It’s the type of film that would be a bit tacky at a different time, but is a highly enjoyable at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

A familiar face appears at the outset of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the next movie straight. Is this a fresh holiday staple?

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 a star of Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The classic narrative unfolds as the tight-fisted Mr Sood is haunted by the apparitions of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least different from all the others, but sadly he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s acting is lifeless—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

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

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

There’s just one issue—he finds out there was an mistake with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to figure out how to pay back the difference.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Early Afternoon: Champagne Problems

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 raison d’etre—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

Driven corporate star Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is assigned to a French chateau to secure an acquisition for a sparkling wine company. On the way, she encounters a man in a bookshop who offers to show her a festive Paris.

An expert recently stated this is the finest new Christmas film of the last several seasons. That’s a bit of a stretch, 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 very good too.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

A Charming Quest

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

The answer is to be discovered, and Chris sets out to find it with the expert help of a group of well-known figures.

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

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch 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 starts by mentioning Christmas classics like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before declaring: “They need to make a movie about the real champions of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the premise, but in practice it’s really a jumble of those inspirations, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually finds her strength.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s gone downhill, but happily here’s a new addition in the saturated market of predictable, sentimental, cheesy—and strangely compelling—festive fodder.

It’s a story as old as time: An American woman travels to a distant snowy land and ends up stumbling across romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher