Devouring 2025's Holiday Movies: The Hits, The Misses, and The Guilty Pleasures.

‘Tis the season to slob out on the sofa and devour a packet of mince pies in front of a good movie, a awful feature, or one that’s awesomely awful.

As always, a selection of latest Christmas films hopes to be part of our festive viewing—potentially even earning a place alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

So, in a noble effort to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to find the festive feeling, I binged as many recent Christmas films as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Beginning, optimistically, on a positive note. This release is the sole 2025 movie on a well-known aggregator's list of the best 100 Christmas movies of all time.

The musical trio are stuck in the UK after finishing their world tour and must get home for Christmas. Their attempts are hindered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who sings to announce they won’t get home until they “rediscover their brotherly magic.”

The banter between the squabbling siblings is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while followers will no doubt pick up on lots of in-jokes as they try 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 solid start to the day.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their family members who will have to sit through it.

Next: A Star in Panto

Hollywood star Kiefer Sutherland appears as a Hollywood star tricked into a traditional British stage show.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and older star Brad Mack, who has seen better days and whose representative has deceived him into thinking he’s starring in high-class London stage.

His Aladdin co-stars inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Oh no I’m not,” he protests. You can guess their reply. That is, unless you’re unfamiliar with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some very funny lines, some touching storylines, and the ensemble is brilliant, too.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

Danny Dyer appears at the outset of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the next movie straight. Could this be a new Christmas tradition?

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 an actor from Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by the filmmaker behind Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale unfolds as the miserly Mr Sood is haunted by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least different from all the others, but regrettably he’s not very compelling and Nayyar’s performance is wooden—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

There's just enough time for a channel's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a endearingly grumpy man who “isn't big on Christmas.”

But after he receives an large festive windfall at work, his wife (played by Morgana Robinson) convinces him blowing the money on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one snag—he finds out there was an error with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to devise a plan for how to pay back the excess.

Fun while it lasts but not lasting.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

This is one of those holiday movies where the festive trappings are in the backdrop—Christmas is the environment of the film rather than its raison d’etre—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

Driven corporate star Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is sent to a country estate to secure an acquisition for a champagne business. En route, she encounters a man in a book store who offers to show her the holidays in the City of Light.

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 touch of class and gives the necessary cozy feelings.

The scene with a extended debate about Die Hard is very good too.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

3.29pm - Finding Father Christmas

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

The truth is to be discovered, and Chris ventures forth to find it with the expert help of a group of well-known scientists and personalities.

It’s understated but sweet, and good viewing while anticipating Santa to visit.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a quarrelling American family who reunite 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 saying: “They need to make a movie about the real champions of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the concept, but in execution it’s really a mash-up of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character finally takes center stage.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

Evening: A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s gone downhill, but thankfully here’s a new entry in the saturated market of predictable, sentimental, cheesy—and utterly watchable—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a narrative as well-worn: An American woman travels to a picturesque cold country and ends up finding romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher