Devouring This Year's Christmas Films: The Hits, The Misses, and The Guilty Pleasures.

It is the time of year to slob out on the sofa and consume a packet of festive treats in front of a terrific flick, a bad movie, or one that’s awesomely awful.

This year, a batch of new seasonal stories strives to join part of our festive viewing—perhaps even joining the ranks alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

So, in a helpful attempt to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to get into the Christmas spirit, I marathoned as many fresh holiday releases as possible in a single day.

First Up: The Jonas Brothers' Holiday Flick

Beginning, ideally, on a high. This release is the only 2025 movie on a well-known aggregator's list of the greatest 100 festive features of all time.

The musical trio find themselves stranded in the UK after wrapping up their international trek and must return for Christmas. Their attempts are thwarted by an evil Santa, who breaks into song to state they won’t get home until they “rediscover their familial spark.”

The back-and-forth between the arguing trio is enjoyable even for the uninitiated, while devotees will undoubtedly notice lots of in-jokes as they try to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a journey of epic proportions.

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

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

8.45am - Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland appears as a celebrity cast a "panto".

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

His pantomime fellow actors inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Absolutely not,” he protests. It's easy to predict their reply. Unless you’re unfamiliar 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 kind of movie that would be a bit tacky at any other time of year, but is a lot of fun at Christmas.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

Danny Dyer pops up at the start of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the second consecutive movie. Might this become a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who picks up 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 director of Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale progresses as the stingy Mr Sood is confronted by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

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

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

There’s just one issue—he discovers there was an mix-up with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to devise a plan for how to return the difference.

Enjoyable but forgettable.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Early Afternoon: Champagne Problems

This is one of those holiday movies where the festive trappings are in the setting—Christmas is the scene 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 dispatched to a vineyard to negotiate a purchase for a champagne business. On the way, she runs into a guy in a literary haven who promises to show her Christmas in Paris.

A critic recently claimed this is the finest new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a Christmas romance with a dash of elegance and gives the obligatory heartwarming sensation.

The scene with a extended debate about Die Hard is particularly strong too.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

3.29pm - Finding Father Christmas

Young Chris, played by Lenny Rush, continues to believe in Father Christmas, regardless of the efforts of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him the reality.

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

It’s gentle but charming, and ideal viewing while anticipating Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the head 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 begins by referencing 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 unsung heroes of the holidays—moms.”

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄

6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s gone downhill, but thankfully here’s a new offering in the packed genre of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and highly entertaining—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a narrative as old as time: An American woman journeys to a distant snowy land and ends up stumbling across romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher