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‘Tis the season for Netflix to bestow us with what we crave every winter season: terrible holiday films. Sure, there are classics like Elf and The Polar Express, but original Netflix holiday movies are cheesy, cosy, and cringey — and we’re more than okay with that. There’s something so soothing about escaping reality and watching a couple fall in love on screen in a winter wonderland in the most predictable but charming way.
Even if you’re not a die-hard rom-com girly (because watching people get together when you’re perpetually single isn’t everyone’s cup of tea), there are plenty of non-romantic festive films available to choose from. Really, Netflix’s collection is *so* vast that there’s a holiday film for everyone. Want cheesy, corny romance? Stream Love Hard. Need a regular Christmassy film to get you in the festive spirit? We suggest That Christmas.
If you’re ready to kickstart your 25 Days Of Christmas and laugh along the way, add our favourite so-bad-they’re-good Netflix holiday movies to your queue. And don’t forget to slip on your festive PJs and grab a hot chocolate. ‘Tis the season!
Hot Frosty
The queen of holiday movies, Lacey Chabert of Mean Girls notoriety, returns with a new rom-com where she plays Kathy Barrett, a young widow looking for love and to reclaim her holiday spirit. The problem is that her hot AF and often-shirtless romantic interest-in-question, played by Schitt’s Creek’s Dustin Milligan, is a snowman — literally. And, get this, his name is Jack! While the film’s premise seems kind of odd, it’s the type of holiday rom-com where you don’t question its quirks. You just enjoy the 92-minute-long ride.
Meet Me Next Christmas
If you fell in love with Christina Milian in the 2019 flick, Falling Inn Love (pun intended), you’ll love her in Meet Me Next Christmas. This time, Milan plays Layla, a young woman running around New York City to get tickets to a sold-out Pentatonix concert in hopes of reconnecting with James, a man she met a year prior. Enter: Teddy, played by Devale Ellis, who volunteers to help her. Because this is a rom-com and no love story is without drama, the trio ends up in a love triangle. James likes Layla, Teddy likes Layla, and Layla likes… who again? Watch and find out.
Our Little Secret
A second-chance romance set during Christmas time and starring two former teen stars? We’re sold — and you should be, too. Lindsay Lohan, whose resurgence into pop culture ironically started with another Netflix holiday film, Falling For Christmas, and Ian Harding (aka Ezra from Pretty Little Liars) play exes Avery and Logan who are forced to spend the holidays together after discovering their current partners are siblings. The angst! Mutual pining! Love confessions and more!
The Merry Gentleman
Speaking of teen stars, Chad Michael Murray (I can hear Gavin DeGraw’s voice piercing through the One Tree Hill title credits already) and Britt Robertson also join Netflix’s holiday bandwagon in The Merry Gentleman. Robertson plays Broadway dancer Ashley Davis who returns to her small town after losing the lead role in a play (it’s giving Sweet Home Alabama, the Christmas edition). While mourning her losses, she turns her grief into motivation by throwing an all-man Christmas-themed revue to help save her parents’ local performing venue. How does Chad Michael Murray fit into all of this? He’s the town’s local carpentry guy and, well, Ashley’s parents’ spot needs a touch-up or two, if you get my drift.
That Christmas
Sometimes, you’re just not in the mood to see two people fall in love (we get it) and if that’s the case, might we recommend That Christmas? It’s not a rom-com but a cute, cosy, animated film about a blizzard wreaking havoc on a small seaside town, altering everyone’s holiday plans including Santa’s. And if the plot isn’t juicy enough for you to watch, did we mention that Brian Cox voices Saint Nick? Calling all Succession fans, if you’ve missed the voice of narcissistic billionaire Logan Harper crooning in your ear, stream That Christmas. It’s the comforting holiday film you need to soothe your soul after this disaster of a year.
Love at First Sight
Love at First Sight doesn’t advertise itself as a holiday movie, but it is one, nonetheless, given that the story takes place in the days leading up to Christmas. Starring The White Lotus’s Haley Lu Richardson as Hadley and Bohemian Rhapsody’s Ben Hardy as Oliver, this rom-com follows two teens who hit it off on a flight, but lose each other at customs, seemingly forever. But, of course, fate has other plans.
Best. Christmas. Ever!
New to Netflix’s holiday roster last year, Best. Christmas. Ever! sees Brandy Norwood as Jackie, an old university friend of Charlotte’s (Heather Graham), who without fail sends a yearly Christmas newsletter boasting about how good her life is. This year, though, Charlotte and her family show up to see if Jackie’s life really is all she says it is.
Falling For Christmas
A Lindsay Lohan-helmed movie is always a good idea. But a Lohan-helmed, cheesy rom-com starring Glee’s Chord Overstreet is even better. Enter: Falling For Christmas. As the spoiled heiress Sierra Belmont, Lohan loses her memory, only to discover the true meaning of life and love (cue the tears). All set in a literal winter wonderland.
Holidate
While Holidate isn’t exclusively a Christmas movie, the 2020 film starring Emma Roberts identifies the season as one of many dreaded holidays that cause single people to shudder. Because it’s inevitable that your aunt twice removed *will* make a comment about the fact that you didn’t bring a +1. But what if you had a platonic friend who was your date to all festive-related events? That’s what Roberts’ character Sloane is about to find out. Of course, with hunky Jackson (Luke Bracey) as her date, things begin to get complicated.
The Princess Switch
By now, Vanessa Hudgens is as synonymous with The Princess Switch franchise as she is with High School Musical. Stacy (Vanessa Hudgens) is a baker from Chicago who finds herself at a prestigious baking competition in Belgravia. Once there, she meets her lookalike, Lady Margaret Delacourt, Duchess of Montenaro (also Hudgens), and the pair switch places. Hijinks and romance ensues.
Operation Christmas Drop
A congressional aide (played by Kat Graham) is sent to a tropical US Air Force base to make a case for its closure, but while there she warms up to the work they’re doing, as well as one of the officers. Hot stars and a tropical locale? What more could we ask for!
A Christmas Prince
The movie that arguably started it all. In this 2017 film, journalist Amber Moore (Rose McIver) travels to Aldovia to cover the rumoured abdication of Prince Richard (Ben Lamb) after the death of his father. On her way to getting the scoop, she finds out there’s more to the prince than meets the eye.
Holiday In The Wild
Kate (Kristin Davis) surprises her husband Drew (Colin Moss) with a second honeymoon in Zambia over the holidays, but he decides to end their marriage instead. Fortunately, Kate finds solace in Africa with baby elephants and Derek (Rob Lowe).
Love Hard
When an LA-based writer (Nina Dobrev) finds the love of her life on a dating app, she flies cross country to spend the holidays with him, only to discover that her perfect guy *isn’t* exactly who he said he was. Rather, she’s been catfished.
A cheesy romance or a cautionary tale? You decide.
A Christmas Prince 2: The Royal Wedding
It’s time to go back to Aldovia. Netflix promised us a Christmas Prince sequel, and it delivers with the wedding of Amber (Rose McIver) and Prince Richard (Ben Lamb). While the movie should hypothetically focus on the royal nuptials, it also dabbles in international politics, redemption arcs, hacking, and economic theory — all while featuring the worst cinematic decorations in history.
A Castle for Christmas
When a famed author is down on her luck (she had a flop of a book), she heads to Scotland to buy a castle (casual!), coming up against the owner who doesn’t really want to sell. In a classic enemies-to-lovers trope, the movie stars Brooke Shields and Cary Elwes as the lead characters.
Christmas Wedding Planner
With just the title, the movie combines the two themes of most cheesy holiday movies: Christmas and weddings! Now that’s a feat. Based on the book Once Upon A Wedding by Stacy Connelly, this movie follows a wedding planner who is thrown for a loop when a private investigator arrives to dig into someone at the wedding.
A Christmas Inheritance
If A Christmas Prince is the alpha in this so-bad-it’s-good equation, A Christmas Inheritance is the omega. They both share CW actresses and a Mad Libs-esque plot (woman + lesson to learn + new city + cute brunette man). So, I propose more of this kind of formula. Rebecca Bloom in A Hanukkah Duke, Melissa Benoist in A Christmas Caper. Liz Gillies in 103 Holiday Puppies. Let’s keep this factory going.
A Christmas Prince 3: The Royal Baby
Amber of Aldovia (Rose McIver) is back with a yuletide mystery to solve. This time, it is the question of who stole an ancient treaty between Aldovia and the Asian country of Penglia. If Amber doesn’t get to the bottom of this whodunit fast, her unborn child could be cursed forever.
Christmas With You
It’s a tale as old as time: Pop star Angelina (Aimee Garcia) decides to do good by travelling to a small town outside of her normal city life and granting a Christmas wish to a super fan, only to discover that said super fan has a super hunky dad (Freddie Prinze Jr.).
The name alone should be enough to sell you on this country-fried rom-com, which merely uses the holiday season as a backdrop for its melodrama involving a cowboy and a writer.
Welcome to the holiday movie that boasts buff, shirtless santas and a capitalist villainess Ashanti serving up Cruella De Vil realness, sans white hair streak, while purring lines like, “Where’s Bruno?! That lazy lout never brought my gloves.”
There is also a whole “Two attractive brunette people fall in love” plot, but, we’re all just here for Bad Ashanti.
Christmas In The Smokies has nearly the exact same name as Christmas In The City, except this movie swaps out a metropolitan department store for something a little bit more down-home.
In Smokies, rather than an ambitious man working to save a business, we have an ambitious woman trying to save a business. This time, there’s also a hunky country music singer as well.
You cannot convince me Pottersville wasn’t legitimately filmed on the Gilmore Girls set. There is no other possibility. So, you can watch A-listers like Christina Hendricks, Ron Pearlman, Ian McShane, and actual two-time Oscar nominee Michael Shannon run around Luke’s Dinner and Doose’s Market in this quirky Christmas comedy that is inexplicably about Bigfoot.
Although every movie on the list was made in the last six years, almost none of them feel even vaguely millennial. Breakup, about a couple who breaks up over the holidays and then lies about it to avoid Christmastime pity, doesn’t have this problem. There are smartphones everywhere, discussions of open marriages, and animal-designed onesies.
This is a world I recognise.
The fact that a Christmas Kiss got a sequel leads me to believe everyone is out here kissing strangers under bizarre circumstances and I’m simply missing out. Thankfully, II follows a completely new pairing than its predecessor, so we can rest assured Wendy from Christmas Kiss 1.0 lived happily ever after.
P.S. This is another Jonathan Bennett holiday flick. Jonathan Bennett is secretly the king of Christmas rom-coms.
Gretchen Weiners, sorry, Lacey Chabert, asks Santa for the courage to stand up for herself. Of course this personality trait only lasts 48 hours and the obvious moral dilemma ensues. Riveting stuff.
48 Christmas Wishes sounds excessive. Set in the North Pole, 2 elves lose a whole town’s letters to Santa. Your standard panic ensues, eventually all is resolved and it’s a classic happy ending.
While most Christmas movies star slender white women who fall in love with square-jawed white men, You Can’t Fight Christmas gives us some diversity. This one features an all-Black cast and an average-sized leading lady in Being Mary Jane guest actress Brely Evans.
The summary of this film literally made me screech and giddily spin around in my chair, so I’m going to let The Spirit Of Christmas speak for itself.
“As Christmas approaches, attorney Kate Jordan travels to Vermont to oversee the sale of an inn,” reads the first half of the description. Okay, cool, that makes sense…but, things take a turn. “Where she falls for a handsome but cursed ghost.”
What?! Go watch this immediately.
This movie combines dogs, lines like, “You should have said, ‘See you latte,’” and Aaron Samuels, I mean, Jonathan Bennett.
Four stars for you, A Dogwalker’s Christmas Tale! You go, A Dogwalker’s Christmas Tale!
There is a Haylie Duff holiday movie just waiting for the world to notice it, and that time has come.
Duff plays an optimistic “love doctor” and revives a man’s metaphorically cold, dead heart. What more could you want? Is it Jerry from Parks And Recreation? Well Jim O’Heir is here too.
If you’re really feeling the anti-romance holiday vibes, there’s also A Christmas Horror Story, a B-list horror film with a festive twist. To best understand ACHS, please know there is a scene where an elf named Shiny (Ken Hall) screams, “I said I don’t want a goddamn cookie,” goes on a curse-laden tirade against a shocked Mrs. Clause (Debra McCabe), and then hacks at his own hand with a miniature axe, spaying blood everywhere.
A Christmas Horror Story is wild.
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