Devouring 2025's Festive Features: The Good, The Bad and The So-Bad-It's-Good.

It is the season to slob out on the couch and consume a box of holiday pastries in front of a great film, a awful feature, or one that’s awesomely awful.

This year, a crop of latest Christmas films hopes to be part of our holiday traditions—potentially even earning a place alongside timeless staples 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 find the Christmas spirit, I watched as many new festive movies as possible in a single day.

7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, hopefully, on a good foot. This film is the exclusive 2025 entry on a famous website's list of the top 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The musical trio are stranded in the UK after wrapping up their global concert series and must get home for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to state they won’t get home until they “find their sibling bond.”

The banter between the arguing trio is amusing even for the non-fan, while followers will no doubt pick up on lots of easter eggs as they attempt to get back using all transportation available.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

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

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

Next: A Star in Panto

Hollywood star Kiefer Sutherland appears as a Hollywood star roped into a pantomime.

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

His Aladdin fellow actors tell him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he protests. One can imagine their retort. Unless you’re unfamiliar with traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some hilarious moments, some touching storylines, and the rest of the cast is brilliant, too.

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

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

An actor shows up at the beginning of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the second film in a row. Could this be a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a singing black cab driver who collects 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 the director of Gurinder Chadha. The familiar story develops 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 South Asian reinterpretation is at least different from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very compelling and Nayyar’s portrayal is lifeless—a problem when he’s so the main character.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

Before lunch for a channel's holiday special—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 (portrayed by Morgana Robinson) talks him into spending the sum on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one issue—he learns there was an error with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to determine how to pay back the remainder.

Pleasant yet unmemorable.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

This is one of those holiday movies where the decorations and snow are in the background—Christmas is the environment of the film rather than its main point—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

High-powered businesswoman Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a vineyard to secure an acquisition for a sparkling wine company. En route, she meets a fellow in a literary haven who offers to show her the holidays in the City of Light.

A critic recently claimed this is the top new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a exaggeration, but it is a holiday love story with a dash of elegance and gives the necessary heartwarming sensation.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

3.29pm - Finding Father Christmas

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

The truth is somewhere, and Chris embarks on a quest to find it with the expert help of a group of well-known scientists and personalities.

It’s low-key but endearing, and good viewing while expecting Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a dysfunctional American family who come back together for the holidays—including other Oscar nominee 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 saying: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s what this is, but in reality it’s really a combination of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually finds her strength.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Evening: A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s taken a dip, but fortunately here’s a new entry in the crowded field of predictable, sentimental, cheesy—and strangely compelling—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a story as familiar as can be: An American woman journeys to a picturesque cold country and ends up finding romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher