2025 - 50 Favorite Films and Reflections on the Year

 

Note that the format for this list has been inspired by Bill Ackerman's annual list of 40 Favorite Films. You can find his lists at https://auteuristtrap.blogspot.com/.

Greetings to all! Hope everyone had a lovely holiday season and a happy new year, and you’re all ready for whatever 2026 may bring (or if by chance you’re reading this well after its initial posting, here’s hoping 2026 hasn’t been / wasn’t too bad of a year). It’s now the time for cinephiles young and old to perform that annual tradition of reflecting on the previous year in film by making their Top 10 lists, talking about how cinema is dying, why X film is good and Y film is bad, and how you’re dumb for liking film Y, and so forth and so on. I’m not going to talk about what films I think are “good” or “bad” since everyone’s taste is unique and I don’t have any authority to pass judgment down on film quality (nor would I ever want to) - my list is simply my favorite films and the ones that spoke to me the most this year - but I will share some brief thoughts on the year before getting into the film titles that stuck with me the most.

On a personal note, my 2025 certainly had its ups and downs, but the highlights included presenting at my first professional engineering conference, as well as a trip to France with a friend (visiting Paris and Normandy) and a trip to Philadelphia to visit friends and participate in a Rocky-themed run (which perhaps I should cover here as its definitely relevant to the film world!) Additionally, my film-related experiences were overwhelmingly positive and undoubtedly a highlight of the year. I had the privilege to attend four film festivals in some degree over the course of the year. In April, it was my first time back at Ebertfest since my senior year of college at the University of Illinois, and while I didn’t attend for long, I did have the joy of seeing Desperately Seeking Susan with Susan Seidelman and Rosanna Arquette in attendance as well as Harlan County, USA with Barbara Kopple, both at the beautiful Virginia Theatre in Champaign. I’d love to attend in 2026 as well, especially after hearing the news that it will unfortunately be the last Ebertfest held in Champaign-Urbana. Back in May, I attended the Chicago Critics Film Festival (CCFF) for the third year in the row at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood. I still find this to be one of the best festivals out there for anyone interested in smaller/indie new releases. It essentially functions as something of a Sundance, SXSW, and TIFF “greatest hits” but it’s far more affordable than any of those festivals, and the programming is hand-selected by the Chicago Film Critics Association, whose members run the festival and are always very welcoming and friendly.

I covered both of those festivals in much more detail earlier in the year on this blog. What I haven’t covered yet is the third annual City of Lights Film Festival in Aurora. While it's smaller than the major Chicago film festivals, it’s a great showcase of some of Aurora’s locations (both new venues and historic buildings), and I thought the film lineup was strong, including a couple titles that made my list. I’m excited to see that festival continue to grow in the future. Without a doubt, however, my key new cinema-related experience of the year was volunteering at the Chicago International Film Festival (ChiFilmFest) in October. I had been encouraged to volunteer by someone I was talking with at CCFF, and while I only thought I’d take a couple shifts I ended up enjoying myself so much I kept signing up for more and more shifts as the festival went on. Not only does volunteering often provide an opportunity to see films at the festival, it’s a lot of fun and it was also fascinating for me to see some of the behind-the-scenes of theater operation, and I greatly valued the ability to meet and interact with both patrons and other volunteers to discuss film. As someone who doesn’t work in the film industry at all, it’s not often I encounter people who follow film the way I do on a regular basis, so it was a delight to make some new friends this way. I’m now convinced that volunteering is the best way to attend a film festival like this one and I can’t wait to volunteer again next year.

Aside from attending festivals, I also enjoyed checking out the Facets in Lincoln Park for the first time to see Hal Hartley’s new film Where to Land, and I had the pleasure of meeting one of my favorite working artists, Matt Farley, when he screened his wonderful new film Evil Puddle at the Music Box. I also enjoyed catching some repertory screenings, including several films at the Robert Altman Centennial put on by the Gene Siskel Film Center (especially finally seeing Nashville for the first time), as well as newly restored titles like Lino Brocka’s Bona and Shinji Sômai’s The Friends. I unfortunately only made it to the Egyptian Theatre in DeKalb once for their annual horror film screenings close to Halloween, but it was a treat to see Night of the Living Dead on the big screen. For more standard movie fare, I continue to feel that AMC’s A-List membership is a great bang for the buck, and even with the quantity of films I see, I’ve still yet to max out at 4 films in one week. With regards to streaming, I continue to be very satisfied with the Criterion Channel - it’s about as good as it gets for a balance of arthouse classics, cult films, and the occasional new release (usually from Janus Films) - but I also need to shoutout Kanopy and Hoopla which, if available through your public library, are free services that offer access to a plethora of titles, including a lot of smaller, under-the-radar new releases. I’d also like to thank the various new acquaintances I’ve made in the Letterboxd community over the past year, as it’s been a treat to read reviews and connect with folks around the world who love cinema as much as I do.

Shifting gears to the year in film that was 2025, I caught up with about 200 films that I would consider to be 2025 releases. As I’m not a critic or in the film industry, I don't have access to screeners, press screenings, etc. to see films early, so I was anticipating needing some time in January to catch up with some leftovers. However, while there’s a handful of films that haven't played by me yet like The Testament of Ann Lee, Is This Thing On?, and Father Mother Sister Brother, I felt as though between the various festivals and the extra quick transition to streaming these days that I’d seen the vast majority of what I’d wanted to for the year and felt good calling it quits by New Year’s Eve. I’m never sure how to answer whether or not 2025 was a “good” year for movies, as that depends not only on what films you see and how you see them, but also whether or not you made a transition in the type of films you seek out. For me, there was a lot that I liked in 2025 and not too many films I saw that I hated, but I’ll acknowledge that I was more actively seeking out films that seemed interesting to me this year and saw fewer titles that I thought beforehand would be outright bad than in previous years. I will say that I had no issue filling out a Top 50 list with films I enjoyed, but I don’t think there were as many immediate all-time favorites for me compared to last year.

I do think comments about them “not making movies like they used to” are a little overblown. There’s plenty of great films out there if you put a little bit of effort in to find them. I’ll acknowledge that indeed the mega-popular blockbuster fare is far less interesting than it used to be, and that’s disappointing. However, for me at least there seems to be more potential for exciting voices in independent cinema than ever before, and there’s still a handful of great studio films that come out from time to time. Now the comments about the theatrical experience dying out? That’s a legitimate concern. The acquisition of Warner Brothers by Netflix does scare me, especially coming in what was an incredibly successful year for Warner Brothers, who had two original films in Sinners and Weapons become box office and cultural phenomenons and another film in One Battle After Another that held its own and is currently a heavy Best Picture favorite. Hopefully this gives Warner Brothers some leverage in pushing for longer theatrical windows from their new Netflix overlords, but I do worry that the future of filmmaking from a studio management perspective is going to be rooted in appealing to the small screens versus the big ones. Netflix films already have a distinct fake-looking gloss to them that bugs me, and it’s even starting to invade their prestige movies like Frankenstein. The seeming desire for watching films at home instead of going out to the theater (people often cite expensive ticket prices and annoying cinema patrons as reasons; I don’t encounter either of those on a regular basis but I’ll acknowledge that most people only go to the movies on special occasions, likely to see a popular film) amplifies that times are changing and going to the cinema just doesn’t seem to be as rooted in the cultural lexicon as it once was. While there will always be an audience for films I do fear that the accessibility of seeing films in the theater - especially for people who don’t live in or near major cities - may severely dwindle. And I don’t even want to get started on artificial intelligence - that’s a Pandora’s box (or, as a local politician near me once said, a “Panda’s door”) for another day - but that is the next major concern that needs to be tackled for the value of cinema as an art form and for all the people involved in the film industry whose careers may be affected. 

Let’s take a break from the doom and gloom to look at some film trends from the past year. I know many have pointed out that there’s a lot of 2025 releases that deal with parenting, both the good and the bad. Actors playing dual roles also was a common trend, as you had the opportunity to see Michael B. Jordan, Robert Pattinson, Dylan O’Brien, Blake Lively, and Robert De Niro in stereo this year (among many others I’m sure). For me, I found a lot of my favorites of the year to take inspiration from the cinema of the 1970s, either through the look and style of the film or through setting the story during that time period, or sometimes both. My hope is that the success of original stories like Sinners will lead to more original stories with blockbuster potential being given the opportunity to get there in the future. And from an awards perspective, the rise of international cinema being taken seriously by American industry award bodies has been wonderful to see. NEON certainly deserves a lot of credit for that, although I’m hoping they don’t develop an exclusive stranglehold over films not in the English language in future years the way they did in 2025.

On a sad note, while celebrity deaths happen every year, it felt like the Grim Reaper was particularly harsh to the film world this past year. David Lynch, Gene Hackman, Robert Redford, Diane Keaton, Rob Reiner, Val Kilmer, Udo Kier, Diane Ladd, Michael Madsen, Terence Stamp, Michelle Trachtenberg, Ted Kotcheff, Joan Plowright, and Graham Greene are just a few of the major cinema talents who passed away in 2025, including some under quite tragic circumstances. We can only hope that 2026 will be kinder and thank all of these artists for the legacies they left on and off screen.

With that, let’s move on to the list. For this list, I defined a 2025 release as one of two things: either 1) a film with an American release date of 2025 that I saw in the year 2025, or 2) a new release that I saw at a film festival in 2025. Thus on here, you’ll find some films that may have premiered in 2024 (or earlier) but weren’t released in the USA until this past year, as well as some titles that have yet to be officially released that I had the privilege of seeing early in 2025. And although I saw an absurd number of movies, there are just as many that I had interest in seeing that I haven’t caught up with. Some of the titles I most wanted to see but didn't get a chance to yet include If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, Father Mother Sister Brother, Wild Diamond, Rebuilding, Blue Moon, The Testament of Ann Lee, My Undesirable Friends: Part 1 - Last Air in Moscow, The Balconettes, Gazer, The Queen of My Dreams, Preparation for the Next Life, Daniela Forever, Motel Destino, A Desert, Corey Feldman vs. the World, Suspended Time, Good Fortune, There’s Still Tomorrow, The Long Walk, Tura!, Shari & Lamb Chop, BLKNWS: Terms and Conditions, Breakdown: 1975, Stationed at Home, It’s All Gonna Break, Roofman, Is This Thing On?, Eternity, Psycho Therapy: The Shallow Tale of a Writer Who Decided to Write About a Serial Killer, Mr. K, One More Shot, Bonjour Tristesse, Three Bad Girls Who Find a Gun and Become Vampires, Pools, Dust Bunny, No! You’re Wrong or: Spooky Action at a Distance, Baby Invasion, Parthenope, Disfluency, Henry Johnson, Best Wishes to All, Julie Keeps Quiet, Predators, Midwinter, Belén, Eric LaRue, Marshmallow, The Dells, When Fall is Coming, After the Hunt, 28 Years Later, The Friend, Armand, Plainclothes, Feel Good Hotline, Fréwaka, John Candy: I Like Me, Time Passages, The Lost Bus, Secret Mall Apartment, Fairyland, Compulsion, Escape from the 21st Century, Eden, Chain Reactions, Sly Lives! (Aka the Burden of Black Genius), Grand Theft Hamlet, Dead of Winter, Sketch, The Chronology of Water, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Mr. Scorsese, Viet and Nam, American Sweatshop, Ballerina, Harvest, Grand Tour, and Warfare. There’s a very good chance several of those may have made my list had I seen them. Of course, there's also a number of festival titles that I missed that I’m hoping to see during their theatrical and/or streaming runs in 2026 and beyond, including Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, Alpha, A Useful Ghost, F*cktoys, My Father’s Shadow, Silent Friend, Magellan, The Love That Remains, Primavera, Franz, Spilt Milk, Brand New Landscape, Palestine 36, All That’s Left of You, Sound of Falling, Mother of Flies, A Poet, The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo, Renoir, New Group, Dry Leaf, The Girl in the Snow, Only Heaven Knows, Gazelle, The Stranger, What Marielle Knows, and Young Mothers, just to name a few.

While coming up with a list of 50 titles may seem like way too many, I still found myself having a hard time deciding which films should make the cut. Sentimental Value, The Voice of Hind Rajab, No Other Choice, Three Goodbyes, Bone Lake, One of Them Days, Presence, A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, Final Destination Bloodlines, Wake Up Dead Man, Nouvelle Vague, Seven Veils, Queens of Drama, Broken Rage, The Dead Thing, Desert Road, Chlorine Kills, Magic Farm, One Golden Summer, Inheritance, Ex-Husbands, We Want the Funk!, Move Ya Body: The Birth of House, and Nobody’s Gonna Do It For You: Ten Years of Sincere Engineer were all films I liked and considered putting on this list at one point in time. This list is also exclusively feature-length films, as I didn’t see very many shorts outside of the CCFF’s shorts programs. Of those, Anthon Chase Johnson’s Strangers in the Same Shirt, Hoku Uchiyama’s Whitch, Philip Thompson’s Living Reality, and Christopher Radcliff’s We Were the Scenery were standouts that I'd recommend quite highly.

I’d also like to note that Eephus was on my list last year as I saw it at the 2024 Chicago International Film Festival so I didn’t consider it for this year - otherwise, it would have made my 2025 list easily.

And with that, I’ll finally stop rambling. Please enjoy my 50 Favorite Films of 2025, and for folks who haven’t seen a ton of new releases, I’m hoping at least one or two of these catches your eye as a film worth checking out.

---

23 Hours

(dir. Bruno Irizarry)

American Football (Live in Los Angeles)

(dir. Steph Rinzler)

April

(dir. Dea Kulumbegashvili)

The Assessment

(dir. Fleur Fortuné)

The Ballad of Wallis Island

(dir. James Griffiths)

The Baltimorons

(dir. Jay Duplass)

Black Bag

(dir. Steven Soderbergh)

Brother Verses Brother

(dir. Ari Gold)

By the Stream

(dir. Hong Sang-soo)

Calle Málaga

(dir. Maryam Touzani)

Castration Movie Anthology ii. The Best of Both Worlds 

(dir. Louise Weard)

Caught by the Tides

(dir. Jia Zhangke)

Cloud

(dir. Kiyoshi Kurosawa)

The Code

(dir. Eugene Kotlyarenko)

Cover-Up

(dir. Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus) 

Darkest Miriam

(dir. Naomi Jaye)

Dead Man's Wire

(dir. Gus Van Sant)

Evil Puddle

(dir. Charles Roxburgh)

Goodbye Horses: The Many Lives of Q Lazzarus

(dir. Eva Aridjis Fuentes)

I'm Your Venus

(dir. Kimberly Reed)

Influencers

(dir. Kurtis David Harder)

Invention

(dir. Courtney Stephens)

It Ends

(dir. Alex Ullom)

It Was Just an Accident

(dir. Jafar Panahi)

Marty Supreme

(dir. Josh Safdie)

The Mastermind

(dir. Kelly Reichardt)

Mirrors No. 3

(dir. Christian Petzold)

The Naked Gun

(dir. Akiva Schaffer)

Oh, Hi!

(dir. Sophie Brooks)

On Becoming a Guinea Fowl

(dir. Rungano Nyoni)

One Battle After Another

(dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)

Pee-wee as Himself

(dir. Matt Wolf)

Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk

(dir. Sepideh Farsi)

Reflection in a Dead Diamond

(dir. Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani)

Relay

(dir. David Mackenzie)

The Secret Agent

(dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho)

The Shrouds

(dir. David Cronenberg)

Sinners

(dir. Ryan Coogler)

Sirāt

(dir. Oliver Laxe)

Sorry, Baby

(dir. Eva Victor)

Souleymane's Story

(dir. Boris Lojkine)

Sunfish (& Other Stories on Green Lake)

(dir. Sierra Falconer)

Toxic

(dir. Saule Bliuvaite)

Twinless

(dir. James Sweeney)

Universal Language

(dir. Matthew Rankin)

Vulcanizadora

(dir. Joel Potrykus)

The Wedding Banquet

(dir. Andrew Ahn)

What Does That Nature Say to You

(dir. Hong Sang-soo)

Where to Land

(dir. Hal Hartley)

Winter in Sokcho

(dir. Koya Kamura)