Binge-Watching This Year's Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

‘Tis the time of year to relax on the couch and devour a box of festive treats in front of a great film, a bad movie, or one that’s terrible yet terrific.

As always, a batch of fresh Christmas films strives to join part of our festive viewing—maybe even earning a place alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

Thus, in a noble effort to separate the winners from the losers, and to embrace the holiday mood, I binged as many new festive movies as possible in a single day.

7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Kicking off, ideally, on a good foot. This is the exclusive 2025 movie on a popular review site's list of the top 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The popular band are stranded in the UK after wrapping up their international trek and must get home for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who sings to declare they won’t get home until they “rekindle their brotherly magic.”

The back-and-forth between the squabbling siblings is entertaining even for the non-fan, while followers will undoubtedly 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 superb for devotees and a positive start to the day.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their loved ones who will have to sit through it.

Next: A Star in Panto

Hollywood star Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a celebrity cast a "panto".

“A panto-what?” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and older star Brad Mack, who has fallen on hard times and whose agent has misled him into thinking he’s starring in renowned British drama.

His pantomime fellow actors inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he retorts. It's easy to predict their retort. Unless you’re not acquainted with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some great jokes, some touching sub-plots, and the rest of the cast is excellent, too.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

An actor shows up at the start of this film, too, insulting someone for the second consecutive movie. Might this become a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who collects 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 the filmmaker behind Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale 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 regrettably he’s not very captivating and Nayyar’s performance is lifeless—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

There’s time for a channel's holiday special—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “doesn’t really do Christmas.”

But after he is awarded an sizable holiday payout at work, his wife (starring Morgana Robinson) talks him into spending the sum 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 determine how to reimburse the difference.

Enjoyable but forgettable.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

1.12pm - Champagne Problems

This is one of those Christmas films where the festive trappings are in the backdrop—Christmas is the setting of the film rather than its core purpose—but it feels cosy and festive all the same.

Ambitious executive Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a vineyard to do a deal for a champagne business. During her travels, she meets a man in a book store who offers to show her the holidays in the City of Light.

An expert recently declared this is the finest new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a exaggeration, but it is a Christmas romance with a dash of elegance and gives the necessary heartwarming sensation.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

3.29pm - Finding Father Christmas

Sixteen-year-old Chris, played by Lenny Rush, continues to believe in Father Christmas, regardless of the persuasion of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him otherwise.

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

It’s low-key but sweet, and perfect viewing while anticipating Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a quarrelling American family who reunite for the holidays—including other Oscar nominee 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 true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s taken a dip, but happily here’s a new entry in the saturated market of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and highly entertaining—festive fodder.

It’s a tale as old as time: An American woman goes on a quest to a far-off wintery locale and ends up discovering romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher