Binge-Watching This Year's Holiday Movies: The Hits, The Misses, and The Guilty Pleasures.

‘Tis the season to lounge on the couch and devour a packet of holiday pastries in front of a good movie, a awful feature, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

Once again, a crop of fresh Christmas films hopes to be part of our holiday traditions—perhaps even finding a spot alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

Therefore, in a helpful attempt to separate the winners from the losers, and to get into the Christmas spirit, I binged as many recent holiday releases as possible in a single day.

First Up: The Jonas Brothers' Holiday Flick

Beginning, optimistically, on a good foot. This film is the exclusive 2025 entry on a famous website'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 endeavors are hindered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to announce they won’t get home until they “rediscover their sibling bond.”

The banter between the squabbling siblings is amusing even for the uninitiated, while followers will undoubtedly catch lots of easter eggs as they try to get back using every mode of travel possible.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

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

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

Late Morning: Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland stars as a movie actor cast a "panto".

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and older action hero Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose agent has tricked him into thinking he’s starring in high-class London stage.

His pantomime co-stars tell him he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he insists angrily. It's easy to predict their retort. Unless you’re not acquainted with traditional stage call-and-response.

There are some very funny lines, some heartwarming side stories, and the ensemble is excellent, too.

It’s the type of film that would be a bit naff at another season, but is a lot of fun at Christmas.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

A familiar face 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 musical taxi operator who picks up Mr Sood, the latest spin 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 Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The familiar story unfolds as the tight-fisted Mr Sood is haunted by the apparitions 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 sadly he’s not very captivating and Nayyar’s performance is flat—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

12.04pm - Stuffed

Before lunch 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 gets an large festive windfall at work, his wife (portrayed by Morgana Robinson) talks him into spending the sum on a family trip to Lapland.

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

Enjoyable but forgettable.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

1.12pm - Champagne Problems

This is one of those holiday movies where the festive trappings are in the backdrop—Christmas is the setting 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 dispatched to a French chateau to do a deal for a champagne business. En route, she meets a fellow in a literary haven who vows to show her the holidays in the City of Light.

A critic recently claimed this is the best new Christmas film of the last several seasons. That’s a bit of a overstatement, but it is a holiday love story with a touch of class and gives the required warm and fuzzy feels.

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

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Afternoon: Finding Father Christmas

Sixteen-year-old 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 otherwise.

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

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

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

Late Afternoon: Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a bickering American family who come back together for the holidays—including other 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 saying: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the concept, but in practice it’s really a combination of those aforementioned movies, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually finds her strength.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Formulaic Fun

The day’s taken a dip, but happily here’s a new offering in the crowded field of cliched, saccharine, over-the-top—and highly entertaining—holiday fare.

It’s a story as well-worn: An American woman journeys to a picturesque cold country and ends up discovering romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher