Marathon Viewing 2025's Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

‘Tis the time of year to relax on the couch and demolish a box of holiday pastries in front of a good movie, a poor film, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

As always, a selection of new holiday movies aims to become part of our holiday traditions—maybe even finding a spot alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

Therefore, in a vital public service to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to get into the holiday mood, I marathoned as many fresh festive movies as possible in a single day.

7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, optimistically, on a good foot. This release is the only 2025 movie on a popular review site's list of the top 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The popular band are stuck in the UK after finishing their global concert series and must make it back for Christmas. Their endeavors are hampered by an evil Santa, who breaks into song to announce they won’t get home until they “find their sibling bond.”

The banter between the arguing trio is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while devotees will certainly pick up on lots of references as they try to get back using all transportation available.

It’s a journey of epic proportions.

It’s not legendary, but is great for fans and a solid start to the day.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their relatives who must sit through it.

8.45am - Tinsel Town

Famous performer Kiefer Sutherland stars as a celebrity tricked into a pantomime.

“A what's a panto??” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and older lead Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose representative has deceived him into thinking he’s performing in high-class London stage.

His pantomime cast-mates let him know he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he insists angrily. One can imagine their retort. Except if you’re unfamiliar with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some very funny lines, some cockle-warming sub-plots, and the ensemble is excellent, too.

It’s the sort of feature that would be a bit naff at any other time of year, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

10.19am - Christmas Karma

An actor shows up at the start of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the next movie straight. Might this become a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who picks up Mr Sood, the latest spin 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 familiar story develops as the miserly Mr Sood is confronted by the ghosts of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This Indian Scrooge is at least unique from all the others, but unfortunately he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s portrayal is flat—a major flaw when he’s so the main character.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

There’s time for a network's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a lovably grouchy guy who “doesn’t really do Christmas.”

But after he is awarded 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 mistake with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to determine how to reimburse the excess.

Pleasant yet unmemorable.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

This is one of those Christmas films where the tree, fairy lights and snow are in the setting—Christmas is the setting of the film rather than its main point—but it feels warm and holiday-like all the same.

High-powered businesswoman Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is assigned to a vineyard to secure an acquisition for a champagne business. On the way, she encounters a guy in a book store who offers to show her a festive Paris.

An expert recently claimed this is the best new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a exaggeration, but it is a Christmas romance with a dash of elegance and gives the required heartwarming sensation.

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

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

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

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

It’s gentle but charming, and perfect viewing while expecting Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

4.39pm - Oh. What. Fun.

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

Pfeiffer begins by referencing holiday staples like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before declaring: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s waned in quality, but fortunately here’s a new offering in the saturated market of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and utterly watchable—festive fodder.

It’s a story as familiar as can be: An American woman journeys to a distant snowy land and ends up finding romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher