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

It is the season to lounge on the couch and consume a box of festive treats in front of a terrific flick, a poor film, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

Once again, a batch of latest holiday movies hopes to be part of our holiday traditions—potentially even earning a place alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (don’t start).

So, in a helpful attempt to sort the crackers from the turkeys, and to find the holiday mood, I marathoned as many recent holiday releases as possible in a single day.

First Up: The Jonas Brothers' Holiday Flick

Starting, hopefully, on a high. This release is the only 2025 title on a well-known aggregator's list of the greatest 100 holiday films of all time.

The Jonas Brothers are stuck in the UK after wrapping up their international trek and must return for Christmas. Their attempts are hampered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who breaks into song to state they won’t get home until they “find their brotherly magic.”

The back-and-forth between the squabbling siblings is entertaining even for the uninitiated, while devotees will undoubtedly catch lots of in-jokes as they try to get back using any means of transport necessary.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

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

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

Next: A Star in Panto

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland stars as a celebrity roped into a "panto".

“A what's a panto??” asks Sutherland’s “temperamental” and aging star Brad Mack, who has fallen on hard times and whose manager has misled him into thinking he’s performing in prestigious English theatre.

His pantomime fellow actors let him know he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he insists angrily. One can imagine their reply. That is, unless you’re unfamiliar with traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some great jokes, some cockle-warming 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 lot of fun at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

A New Spin on Scrooge

An actor appears at the start of this film, too, insulting someone for the second film in a row. Could this be a new Christmas tradition?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who collects Mr Sood, the modern take 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 classic narrative develops as the miserly Mr Sood is confronted by the apparitions of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This Indian Scrooge is at least different from all the others, but regrettably he’s not very compelling and Nayyar’s portrayal is wooden—a significant issue when he’s so the main character.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

Lunchtime: Stuffed

Before lunch 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 £8,000 Christmas bonus at work, his wife (played by Morgana Robinson) convinces him splurging the cash on a vacation to Lapland.

There’s just one problem—he learns 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.

Enjoyable but forgettable.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

1.12pm - Champagne Problems

This is one of those Christmas films where the decorations and snow are in the setting—Christmas is the setting of the film rather than its raison d’etre—but it feels comfortable and seasonal all the same.

Ambitious executive Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is sent to a French chateau to secure an acquisition for a sparkling wine company. On the way, she meets a guy in a book store who promises to show her Christmas in Paris.

A commentator recently declared this is the best new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a festive dalliance with a touch of class and gives the required cozy feelings.

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

Sixteen-year-old Chris, played by Lenny Rush, holds onto his belief in Father Christmas, despite the attempts of his dad (played by James Buckley) to tell him otherwise.

The secret is to be discovered, 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 expecting Santa to visit.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

A Star-Studded Family Drama

Michelle Pfeiffer is the mother of a bickering American family who come back together for the holidays—including fellow Oscar nominee Felicity Jones, Chloe Grace Moretz, Jason Schwartzman, and dad Denis Leary.

Pfeiffer starts by mentioning 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 the premise, but in practice it’s really a combination of those forerunner films, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually finds her strength.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s taken a dip, but fortunately here’s a new entry in the saturated market of predictable, sentimental, cheesy—and highly entertaining—seasonal comfort food.

It’s a tale 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