Marathon Viewing This Year's Christmas Films: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

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

Once again, a crop of new seasonal stories strives to join part of our holiday traditions—potentially even finding a spot alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

Therefore, in a vital public service to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to get into the festive feeling, I marathoned as many new Christmas films as possible in a single day.

7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, optimistically, on a high. This is the sole 2025 entry on a famous website's list of the best 100 festive features of all time.

The Jonas Brothers end up stranded in the UK after wrapping up their international trek and must return for Christmas. Their efforts are thwarted by an malevolent Father Christmas, who sings to declare they won’t get home until they “rekindle their sibling bond.”

The back-and-forth between the arguing trio is enjoyable even for the non-fan, while followers will undoubtedly pick up on 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 a timeless masterpiece, but is excellent for devotees and a positive start to the day.

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

8.45am - Tinsel Town

Famous performer Kiefer Sutherland appears as a celebrity roped into a "panto".

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

His pantomime fellow actors let him know he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he insists angrily. It's easy to predict their response. That is, unless you’re ignorant of traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some hilarious moments, some cockle-warming storylines, and the supporting actors is cracking, too.

It’s the kind of movie that would be a bit tacky at any other time of year, but is a highly enjoyable at Christmas.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

An actor shows up at the beginning of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the second consecutive movie. Is this a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a singing black cab driver who encounters Mr Sood, the newest interpretation 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 familiar story unfolds as the miserly Mr Sood is visited by the apparitions of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least distinct from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s performance is flat—a problem when he’s so the focal point.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

12.04pm - Stuffed

There’s time for a major broadcaster's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a lovably grouchy guy who “isn't big on Christmas.”

But after he receives an £8,000 Christmas bonus at work, his wife (starring Morgana Robinson) talks him into spending the sum on a family trip to Lapland.

There’s just one snag—he learns there was an mix-up with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to devise a plan for how to pay back the remainder.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

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

Driven corporate star Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is assigned to a French chateau to do a deal for a sparkling wine company. On the way, she runs into a guy in a literary haven who offers to show her a festive Paris.

A critic 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 obligatory cozy feelings.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

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

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

It’s low-key but sweet, and ideal viewing while waiting for Santa to visit.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

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

Pfeiffer opens by name-dropping classic festive films like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before saying: “They need to make a movie about the real champions of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the premise, but in execution it’s really a jumble of those forerunner films, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually takes center stage.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s gone downhill, but thankfully here’s a new offering in the saturated market of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and utterly watchable—holiday fare.

It’s a story as old as time: An American woman goes on a quest to a distant snowy land and ends up finding romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher