In No Particular Order: My Ten Favorite Films of 2025
2025 was a great year for movies.
A few things before I get to the list.
The difficulty I had putting together my list this year was I had too many options. I spent a week swapping in a handful of films in the last spot only to amend it again and again. It was a good year at the movies.
So, let me just lay out some of the films that didn’t make it on this list but were strong considerations.
The Naked Gun
28 Years Later
Wake Up Dead Man
KPop Demon Hunters
Warfare
Jay Kelly
Companion
There are more and you can see them all via this list on Letterboxd.
Also, I have a cut off date for when I put this list together. There are a few other films in the Oscar conversation that I haven’t seen yet. I might see them and regret not having them on the list, but that’s life.
What I valued most this year were films that either surprised me, entertained me, or spoke to me in the moment. The ones on this film did all three. There was something that I took away from them as I left the theater and stayed with me not just for the ride home, but for the days that followed.
I tried a few different songs for this montage but came back to Foxy Shazam’s “Oh Lord.” It was used in the opening credits for Peacemaker Season 2. It is a song that tied the films together for me:
“There is always a wrong to your right. There will always be a war somewhere to fight. God knows I’ve had some tough f***ing years. Oh Lord, oh Lord, keep on keeping on…”
Amen.
Here are my ten favorite films of 2025…in no particular order.
First the video:
Now, the list.
F1: Directed by Joseph Kosinski. Written by Joseph Kosinski and Ehren Kruger
An absolute cinematic thrill grounded in the best of the American cinematic traditions - a movie star and spectacle. In this case, it is Brad Pitt playing an aged race car driver recruited to help an F1 team win. It has all the hallmarks of a sports film, including the old guy teaching the young guy a few things. It is an absolute blast that looked downright gorgeous on the IMAX screen thanks to the cinematography of Claudio Miranda and company.
Marty Supreme: Directed by Josh Safdie. Written by Josh Safdie and Ronald Bronstein.
I truly don’t know if I wanted to see the titular Marty Supreme, real name Marty Mauser and played by Timothée Chalamet, win or lose in this film. I think the truth is that I wanted to both see him win and lose in equal measure. He is a despicable rascal, but I’ll be if he isn’t charming. I truly enjoyed every second of this wild and kinetic film.
In terms of pacing this film felt like Uncut Gems, the last Safdie Brothers movie. This is the first one with a singular Safdie Brother and you get the sense that the frenetic pacing comes from him. What is Benny up to? More on that in a minute…
Weapons: Written and Directed by Zach Cregger
When I was growing up, the covers of Stephen King books were absolutely enchanting. They promised to be something fascinating and horrifying, while also telling me that I would enjoy every minute of being led through a story crafted by an expert storyteller.
All this is to say that Weapons is the Stephen King book cover of movies. It is a confident, scary, and entertaining film from Zach Cregger. The characters are all engaging because the actors, including Josh Brolin, Julie Garner, Alden Ehrenreich, Amy Madigan, and others, are perfect as those characters. Madigan is rightly being celebrated, but Alden Ehrenreich continues his streak of being an understated, yet commanding presence in every film he is in.
The Smashing Machine: Written and Directed by Benny Safdie
The other singular Safdie Brother film of 2025. This one is the exact opposite of Marty Supreme and Uncut Gems. Benny Safdie tells this narrative using documentary film techniques. I found it to be utterly captivating. He just lets the scenes play out and often shoots them from a distance. It’s presented as a sports movie, but it’s a character story. It’s not a story about an unknown great, it’s a story about a “never-was.”
Also, I think we can say that Emily Blunt is this generation’s Meryl Streep or Glenn Close, right?
Eddington: Written and Directed by Ari Aster
It is reductive to call this 2020: The Movie, and yet, it is 2020: The Movie. More specifically, it is about how viewing the events of 2020 through the social media algorithms absolutely wrecked our brains.
It’s a fever dream of a film, but an entertaining one. I laughed out loud as often as I shook my head in disbelief. I also felt wildly uncomfortable. I can’t say that I can trust the person that says they watched this movie and didn’t see themself in it. We all lost our minds in 2020.
Not If I See You First: Written and Directed by Aaron Wertheimer
It might not be completely fair to include this in a public list of my favorite films of 2025 because it’s a micro-budget film that is not wildly available. Still, I loved it. More to the point, I was astonished by it. Aaron made a film that is like The Lonely Island meets David Lynch. It’s confident, it’s funny, and it’s one of the best-produced films I saw last year.
One Battle After Another: Written and Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
This film’s politics get the most attention in “the discourse,” but I saw that all as window dressing for a film from a Gen X filmmaker about how adults fail the youth. Nearly every adult in this film is childish and causing real damage as a result. The youth are having to navigate through the mess.
The Secret Agent: Written and Directed Kleber Mendonça Filho
I found this film about how life thrives under a brutal and unjust dictatorship to be absolutely beautiful. What’s a positive way to say that I was haunted by the last few moments? However you might say it, that is how I felt. There was a sadness, but also something joyous. There was defeat, but also resilience.
Sinners: Written and Directed by Ryan Coogler
On one hand, it’s a vampire story. On the other hand, it’s about the power of music. It’s also a story about race relations in America. It also is about spirituality. It’s also a straight-up crowd-pleasing film with a stellar action sequence at the end.
It’s all of these things, all at once, and it is incredible.
Superman: Written and Directed by James Gunn
The Superman we need right now. James Gunn has a way of making misfits shine. In this film, he takes Superman and makes him a misfit. He doesn’t do it by making him angsty or weird. He does it by turning up the hope, kindness, compassion, and heroism of Superman to 11, while setting the film in a world that wants him to turn it down. It works because of the total commitment from David Corenswet and a great supporting cast.
It’s a thrilling, fun, and weird superhero film about how kindness, protecting people, and doing the right thing no matter what is thrown your way is a real super power.
Which is not a bad lesson to take from 2025.
One final note, one of the best times I had at the theater was watching Minecraft with my kids. They loved it and I loved watching it with them.