Binge-Watching The Latest Holiday Movies: The Hits, The Misses, and The Guilty Pleasures.

‘Tis the season to relax on the couch and devour a packet of mince pies in front of a terrific flick, a awful feature, or one that’s terrible yet terrific.

Once again, a crop of latest seasonal stories strives to join part of our festive viewing—maybe even joining the ranks alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

Thus, in a helpful attempt to separate the winners from the losers, and to find the Christmas spirit, I watched as many new Christmas films as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Kicking off, hopefully, on a high. This film is the sole 2025 movie on a well-known aggregator's list of the best 100 holiday films of all time.

The popular band end up stuck in the UK after wrapping up their global concert series and must get home for Christmas. Their attempts are hampered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who sings to announce they won’t get home until they “rekindle their brotherly magic.”

The banter between the squabbling siblings is amusing even for the uninitiated, while devotees will no doubt catch lots of in-jokes as they attempt to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

It’s not an all-time classic, but is excellent for devotees and a good start to the day.

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

8.45am - Tinsel Town

Famous performer Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a movie actor roped into a pantomime.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and aging action hero Brad Mack, who has fallen on hard times and whose representative has misled him into thinking he’s starring in high-class London stage.

His pantomime fellow actors inform him he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he protests. One can imagine their retort. Unless you’re ignorant of traditional stage call-and-response.

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

It’s the sort of feature that would be a bit tacky at a different time, but is a lot of fun at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

Danny Dyer appears at the beginning of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the next movie straight. Is this a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who encounters Mr Sood, the modern take 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 director of Gurinder Chadha. The familiar story unfolds as the tight-fisted Mr Sood is confronted by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least distinct from all the others, but sadly he’s not very compelling and Nayyar’s portrayal is lifeless—a problem when he’s so the focal point.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

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

But after he gets an large festive windfall at work, his wife (starring Morgana Robinson) persuades him splurging the cash 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 figure out how to reimburse the remainder.

Pleasant yet unmemorable.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Early Afternoon: Champagne Problems

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

Driven corporate star Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is sent to a vineyard to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. On the way, she runs into a fellow in a literary haven 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 overstatement, 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, holds onto his belief in Father Christmas, in spite of 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 expert help of a group of well-known figures.

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

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

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 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 real champions of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s what this is, but in execution it’s really a jumble of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character at last comes into her own.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s taken a dip, but happily here’s a new offering in the crowded field of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and strangely compelling—seasonal comfort food.

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

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher