Marathon Viewing 2025's Festive Features: The Good, The Bad and The So-Bad-It's-Good.
‘Tis the season to lounge on the sofa and consume a packet of festive treats in front of a great film, a bad movie, or one that’s so bad it’s good.
This year, a selection of new holiday movies strives to join part of our holiday traditions—potentially even finding a spot alongside beloved favorites like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (no arguments).
Thus, in a vital public service to separate the winners from the losers, and to embrace the festive feeling, I binged as many recent Christmas films as possible in a single day.
7.17am - A Very Jonas Christmas Movie
Starting, hopefully, on a high. This release is the sole 2025 title on a famous website's list of the best 100 festive features of all time.
The popular band are stuck in the UK after concluding their world tour and must make it back for Christmas. Their attempts are thwarted by an villainous Saint Nick, who bursts into melody to announce they won’t get home until they “rekindle their brotherly magic.”
The repartee between the bickering brothers is amusing even for the non-fan, while fans will undoubtedly pick up on 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 a timeless masterpiece, but is excellent for devotees and a solid start to the day.
Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their family members who are obliged to sit through it.
Late Morning: Tinsel Town
A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland appears as a celebrity cast a pantomime.
“A panto-what?” asks Sutherland’s “hard-to-work-with” and ageing lead Brad Mack, who has fallen on hard times and whose manager has tricked him into thinking he’s starring in high-class London stage.
His pantomime fellow actors inform him he’s playing Buttons. “Oh no I’m not,” he protests. It's easy to predict their retort. Except if you’re not acquainted with traditional panto catchphrases.
There are some very funny lines, some cockle-warming side stories, and the rest of the cast is cracking, too.
It’s the type of film that would be a bit tacky at another season, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.
Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄🎄
Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma
An actor pops up at the outset of this film, too, delivering a signature line for the second consecutive movie. Could this be a new Christmas tradition?
This time, he’s a singing black cab driver who encounters Mr Sood, the newest interpretation 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 Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale develops as the stingy Mr Sood is visited by the spirits of Christmas past, present and future, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.
This South Asian reinterpretation is at least distinct from all the others, but sadly he’s not very charismatic and Nayyar’s performance is lifeless—a problem when he’s so the main character.
Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄
12.04pm - Stuffed
Before lunch for a channel's original festive film—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “avoids Christmas.”
But after he is awarded an sizable holiday payout at work, his wife (played by Morgana Robinson) persuades him blowing the money on a vacation to Lapland.
There’s just one problem—he finds out there was an mix-up with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to figure out how to reimburse the remainder.
Enjoyable but forgettable.
Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄
1.12pm - Champagne Problems
This is one of those Christmas films where the festive trappings are in the setting—Christmas is the environment of the film rather than its raison d’etre—but it feels cosy and festive all the same.
Driven corporate star Sydney (played by Minka Kelly) is dispatched to a vineyard to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. On the way, she meets a fellow in a literary haven who promises to show her the holidays in the City of Light.
A critic recently declared this is the best new Christmas film of the recent era. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a Christmas romance with a hint of sophistication and gives the necessary warm and fuzzy feels.
The scene with a extended debate about Die Hard is notable too.
Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄
A Charming Quest
Young Chris, played by Lenny Rush, continues to believe in Father Christmas, despite the attempts of his dad (starring James Buckley) to tell him the reality.
The answer is out there, and Chris ventures forth to find it with the assistance of a team of well-known scientists and personalities.
It’s understated but sweet, and good viewing while waiting for Santa to visit.
Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄
4.39pm - Oh. What. Fun.
Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a quarrelling American family who gather 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 true heroes of the holidays—moms.”
So that’s the concept, but in execution it’s really a jumble of those forerunner films, at least until Pfeiffer’s character eventually finds her strength.
Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄
6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret
The day’s taken a dip, but fortunately here’s a new entry in the crowded field of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and utterly watchable—festive fodder.
It’s a narrative as familiar as can be: An American woman journeys to a distant snowy land and ends up stumbling across romance.
In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher
