(This article is part of our Best of 2025 series.)
It’s always tricky to distill a whole year’s worth of films into five — especially when you haven’t had a chance to see many of the year-end films — but that’s the name of the game, so let’s attempt to do this.
Materialists
Now I am the first to admit that I’m not a fan of Dakota Johnson’s acting abilities – she’s far more interesting on press tours than she is on the big screen – but she perfectly suits the character of Lucy the Matchmaker in Materialists. The premise is one we’ve seen before – who will she end up with? – but what makes this film so compelling to me is the conversations the characters have along the way. Meaty, hurtful, awkward conversations about life and love and how the fairytale romantic relationship is exactly that – fiction. Celine Song’s confident direction and beautifully honest script are something I will visit again and again, as it’s the most intellectually stimulating and painfully real film I saw last year.
Sinners
Good heavens! What a film. If you haven’t yet seen Ryan Coogler’s genre-bending Sinners, you’re missing out on one of the most confident statements of Coogler’s career. This foray into the blues and how they developed is unashamedly seductive, drawing its audience in with each glorious frame and accompanying note by the ever-impressive Ludwig Göransson. It would be a grievance to call this a standard vampire flick (although it’s a great one in that regard, too); it manages to be social commentary while being wildly entertaining. Michael B. Jordan’s dual roles are phenomenal and equally matched by the rest of the cast. It also offers up the most unforgettable scene seen on the big screen in 2025 – the “I Lied to You” sequence – which convinced me completely of the powerful, spiritual hold music has on us all.
Wake Up Dead Man
Rian Johnson has perfected his formula here: a stellar cast, sharp, meaty dialogue, and clues that keep you guessing until the truth is revealed at the end. Thank goodness he “messed up” Star Wars because it saddens me to think there is a timeline where he was asked to do more Star Wars films instead of making sequels to Knives Out. Benoit Blanc is quickly becoming a classic modern character, and in his third outing as the modern Sherlock with a southern drawl, his charm is fully developed and has me wanting more of him. The three films are stylistically similar, yet each unravels in its own outrageous way. Keep them coming, Johnson.
The Oscar-Nominated Live-Action Short Films
Okay, so this may be seen as an odd pick, but it has become an annual tradition of mine to watch the compilation of short films at my local cinema (and if it’s not showing nearby, I’m pretty sure you can rent them online at shorts.tv). Most years, there are one or two that I never want to see again, but this year, all five nominees in the Live-Action category were outstanding! From a quirky exploration of that annoying “I am not a Robot” message that pops up on your screen, to thought-provoking political pieces and the grey areas around poaching, these short films have to tell a full story very quickly, and so they are inevitably rich and captivating. This year, as in most years, the stories come from all over the world, exposing audiences to new directors and actors who may be quite well-known in their own country. Do yourself a favour and look out for these screenings when the 2026 nominations are announced. But until then, there’s the fantastic 2025 slate to keep you occupied.
The Brutalist
I know that this came out in 2024, but it was only released in my country in late February. This stunning epic really blew me away, not only with Adrien Brody’s lead performance as the complex Jewish architect, László Tóth, but also by the sheer vastness of the story. I loved that director Brady Corbet was uncompromising in his vision for the film, going so far as to include an actual intermission in the film – more of this (if used correctly), please. The cinematography reflected the architecture of the period with clean perfection, and the film came together in a way few films over three hours long are able to. Those three-and-a-half hours can seem like one heck of a slog in theory, but when pulled off by the right people, it feels shorter than some of the two hours of content masquerading as cinema we are sometimes subjected to.
Honourable mentions go to One Battle After Another, Don’t Let’s Go to the Dog’s Tonight, and Thunderbolts.
What are your thoughts on the movies that made my top five? Share them down below!
