The best films of 2025: The ballots

It wasn’t a great year for animation by any stretch—the domination of the mid-yet-catchy KPop Demon Hunters included (maybe that should’ve been my pick for overrated?)—but there’s always a bright spot if you look hard enough. This year, that spot is the wonderful gem Little Amélie Or The Character Of Rain, which adapts an early-days autofiction with a child’s eye. The blocky colors and fantastical imagery from directors Maïlys Vallade and Liane-Cho Han give the film a spry coming-of-age curiosity, while its precocious storytelling stumbles its way into profound ideas.

Biggest disappointment: Scarlet

Remember how this wasn’t a great year for animation? The field seemed wide open for Mamoru Hosoda to dominate with the Hamlet-adjacent epic Scarlet, but the Belle filmmaker’s overburdened fantasy lodges its heroine in hell and sticks itself squarely in purgatory. No movie where a cool anime princess gets this grimy should drag this badly.

Most welcome surprise: The Long Walk

Stephen King adaptations have a spotty track record, which is getting spottier the more that those bringing his work to the screen worship his books. But Francis Lawrence, mostly through dedication to the original text, made The Long Walk into a grim and essential B-movie for our time. His perfect ensemble of young men lurched forward with enough endearing realism that the more harrowing aspects of the dystopian story could almost be put out of mind—until a shot rang out, a body dropped, and we were all jolted back to the real world. A ballsy and political genre movie, mean and exciting.

Matt Schimkowitz

Top 15

1. Marty Supreme
2. One Battle After Another
3. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You
4. Blue Moon
5. Superman
6. My Undesirable Friends: Part I—Last Air In Moscow
7. Weapons
8. The Mastermind
9. Sorry, Baby
10. The Naked Gun
11. Avatar: Fire And Ash
12. Black Bag
13. Train Dreams
14. The Phoenician Scheme
15. Good Boy

Outlier: Marty Supreme

I was a little disappointed to see my favorite film of the year, Josh Safdie’s force of nature Marty Supreme, fail to make our list. (I have to imagine it would drive Marty mad, too.) In Marty Supreme, Timothée Chalamet proves he has juice to spare as the overconfident ping-pong tornado Marty Mauser, a miserable guy you can’t take your eyes off but must avoid at all costs. Set in production designer Jack Fisk’s meticulously recreated mid-century Manhattan, Marty Supreme is both an engrossing story of immigrant assimilation and table tennis supremacy as Marty attempts to paddle his way out of squalor before falling into ever-approaching fatherhood. Chalamet holds the eye of the tornado as the director reveals which of the Safdie’s boys is most prone to panic attacks—and it definitely wasn’t the director of The Smashing Machine. Marty Supreme proves itself the successor of Uncut Gems with its depiction of the gnarly Jewish trials faced by a man with the uncontrollable urge to prove himself, especially when he doesn’t have to.

Most overrated: Frankenstein

It’s common for a passion project to fall flat, but few could have prepared me for how slowly Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein would lumber. A perfect marriage of material and moviemaker, del Toro’s film didn’t need to bend Mary Shelley’s novel to his whims. After all, Frankenstein’s creature is nothing if not the misunderstood monster from which del Toro has based his whole creature-feature career. Yet, a bit like a dog chasing a car, once he gets it, he’s unsure what to do with it. It’s not without its charms. The filmmaker put all of Netflix’s money on screen, through gorgeous sets, costumes, and make-up, and Jacob Elordi is tremendous as The Creature. But the screenplay overwrites the Modern Prometheus, while feeling like it’s missing some connective tissue. Now that it’s manifested as a quasi-autobiographical tale about an earnest artist collecting blood money to make a masterpiece that he inevitably hates, it’s hard not to think that del Toro was as disappointed by Frankenstein as I was.

Biggest disappointment: Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning

It took eight movies, but Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning is the first in the long-running franchise to prove how insufferable the IMF can be when all they do is reiterate the mission to generals for an hour and a half. While the second half of The Final Reckoning makes good on the thrills, delivering submarine and biplane sequences that rank among the series’ best, the first overlong half is a merciless slog of exposition. Director Christopher McQuarrie long prided himself on making up the story as he went along, allowing the locations to inspire the set pieces. For the first time in the franchise, McQuarrie and Tom Cruise flail as they figure out where to take things, as the script pads out Ethan Hunt’s final fight with flat plot twists and uninspired character deaths. Two years removed from the initial Reckoning, The Final Reckoning makes the case for simply making one movie…and actually writing an ending before shooting begins.

Most welcome surprise: Superman

I expected to like James Gunn’s Superman, but was unprepared for how much I loved it. It’s not easy to take the oldest character in Hollywood’s most tired genre and give him a fresh coat of paint. Yet, after 15 years of watching Superman glower, the bright and zippy Big Blue of Gunn’s film was a burst of unexpected joy in a Snyderverse-tinged 2025. David Corenswet is a disarming Man Of Steel, both imposing and wounded, but it’s Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor that’s the real revelation. There have been great Supermen before, but Luthor has been notoriously tricky to pull off on screen. No longer a goofy realtor or jittery tech bro, Hoult taps into jealousy, which allows the ur-comic book villain to come off as a threat for a change. The first step in a new cinematic universe at a time when most could do with one fewer, Gunn’s film, through kinetic action, irreverent humor, and a unique take on caped crusaders, opens DC up to all audiences, some of whom are dealing with their third theatrical Superman this century, and some whom are meeting him for the first time. With the help of his cousin’s trusty dog (and who didn’t love Krypto?), Superman flew smoothly despite the weight of an entire studio on its back.

Saloni Gajjar

Top 15

1. A Nice Indian Boy
2. Sinners
3. One Battle After Another
4. No Other Choice
5. Sorry, Baby
6. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You
7. Hallow Road
8. The Perfect Neighbor
9. Homebound
10. Sister Midnight
11. Together
12. On Swift Horses
13. The Secret Agent
14. The Ballad Of Wallis Island
15. Weapons

Outlier: A Nice Indian Boy 

One of my favorite films of the year, Roshan Sethi’s A Nice Indian Boy, remains vastly underrated. A deceptively simple rom-com, it’s the sweet tale of Naveen (Karan Soni) introducing his boyfriend, Jay (Jonathan Groff), to his South Asian family and attempting to embark on some sort of happily ever after—except, Naveen, despite coming out to his family, still struggles with his repressed emotions and the cultural barriers in his relationship. A movie full of love and inspired heavily by Bollywood’s Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, I hope it eventually gets the recognition it deserves. 

Most overrated: Hamnet

Anyone who watches Hamnet will admit it’s affecting; the subject matter is inherently devastating, after all. However, the attempts to evoke tears are too cold and calculated to land. The lengthy climax, in particular, cements that for me. In other words, ideal Oscar bait, even if Jessie Buckley is innocent.

Most underrated: Homebound 

It’s been a terrific year for international movies (No Other Choice, Sirat, The Secret Agent, and It Was Just An Accident, to name just a few), but India’s official Oscar submission is being slept on. Neeraj Ghaywan’s vital Homebound gnaws at you with raw political and social commentary. It centers on two impoverished best friends who dream of becoming police officers, but instead find their bond tested by hardships. Still, they persist and work meager jobs in a city, until the pandemic hits, forcing them to make an arduous journey back to their village. Homebound is consistently harrowing, but stars Vishal Jethwa and Ishaan Khatter infuse it with enough joy to balance it out.

Katie Rife

Top 15

1. The Voice Of Hind Rajab
2. On Becoming A Guinea Fowl
3. The Testament Of Ann Lee
4. Sound Of Falling
5. The Perfect Neighbor
6. It Was Just An Accident
7. Sorry, Baby
8. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You
9. April
10. One Battle After Another
11. The Secret Agent
12. Reflections In A Dead Diamond
13. Weapons
14. Mistress Dispeller
15. Sinners

Outlier: The Voice Of Hind Rajab

I hope that more people get the chance to see The Voice Of Hind Rajab, because Kaouther Ben Hania’s Venice prizewinner is the most impactful film I’ve seen this year. Told in an urgent docudrama style that blends reenactments with actual audio, the film tells the story of Hind Rajab, a six-year-old Palestinian girl who spent many torturous hours trapped inside a car surrounded by the dead bodies of her family members in the Gaza Strip. Ben Hania’s approach unpacks the heartbreaking reality of the situation, with a plainspoken immediacy that still allows viewers to draw their own conclusions. It’s masterful work, combining throat-catching tension and profound sorrow into an immediate and powerful call for accountability.

Most underrated: Mistress Dispeller

Although Americans are more exposed to Chinese culture than ever on TikTok, the dialogue between the countries in cinema is still limited. Elizabeth Lo’s astounding documentary Mistress Dispeller is a perfect ambassador, introducing an exotic concept—the Chinese industry of “mistress dispellers,” professionals who are hired to intervene in extramarital affairs—and proceeding to unpack what makes it both uniquely Chinese and universally human. She does so through the story of a lonely married woman, her unfaithful husband, and his even lonelier mistress, all of whom open up to Lo alongside Wang Zhenxi, the “mistress dispeller” of the title. The level of access Lo has to her subjects is extraordinary, as is her compassion for all involved. It’s a delicate film about a delicate situation, which might explain why its release this fall was so quiet. I’ll make some noise on its behalf.

Jesse Hassenger

Top 15

1. One Battle After Another
2. The Phoenician Scheme
3. Twinless
4. Presence
5. Black Bag
6. Sinners
7. The Mastermind
8. Eephus
9. Splitsville
10. Train Dreams
11. 28 Years Later
12. Sister Midnight
13. The Testament Of Ann Lee
14. Highest 2 Lowest
15. Wake Up Dead Man

Outlier: Twinless

Twinless got great reviews out of Sundance and during its modest commercial release in September, but it’s not the type of movie that goes the distance and actually makes a mark in year-end accolades. Search me as to why; building on the genre-bending assurance of his sort-of-rom-com Straight Up, writer-director James Sweeney crafts a tonally tricky hybrid of buddy comedy, psychological drama, and erotic stalker thriller with resonant feelings of loneliness and grief beneath its cleverness. Don’t read much more about it; just see it. 

Most overrated: Sentimental Value

None of the movies I’ve seen from The A.V. Club‘s collective list strikes me as egregiously overpraised—which is only surprising insofar as I assumed Sentimental Value would make the list, as it has so many others. I’ve been a fan of writer-director Joachim Trier since Reprise, and especially loved The Worst Person In The World, starring Renate Reinsve, who returns for Sentimental Value. It was a shock, then, to find the admittedly well-made Value so schematic, even predictable in its story of a film director (Stellan Skarsgård) kinda-sorta trying to make amends for his absentee parenting through his art. Instead of the self-reflexive playfulness this seems to invite, the movie is staid and somber to a fault, forming an impressive but not especially enjoyable contrast with the humor woven in between the minor tragedies of Worst Person. 

Most underrated: Honey Don’t!

Even some fans of the first Ethan Coen/Tricia Cooke collaboration Drive Away Dolls blanched at their second in a loosely planned trilogy of queer-themed B-movies, a contemporary-yet-retro California noir featuring Margaret Qualley as a well-dressed private eye and Chris Evans as a crooked religious cult leader. Admittedly, the film’s central mystery doesn’t develop as smoothly or hang together as elegantly as the best detective yarns. Watch a bunch of classic ’40s noir, though, and you’ll notice that shortcoming cropping up more often than one might assume. The particular pleasure of this funny, sexy, crisply shot genre exercise is its inversion of noir tropes, starting with the placement of Qualley in the Humphrey Bogart role, where, as a queer woman, her character must tamp down slightly more of her no-nonsense toughness to navigate a world of cops and crooks. Qualley is an intriguing presence in plenty of other movies; in Coen and Cooke’s world, she’s a damn star. 

Biggest disappointment: The Wedding Banquet

Lily Gladstone, Kelly-Marie Tran, Bowen Yang, and Oscar-winner Youn Yuh-jung star in a romantic dramedy updating an Ang Lee classic, directed by Andrew Ahn (Driveways), and the result is… nothing?! A movie that strains to reach the heights of “pleasant enough?!” Jay Kelly may have been the first Noah Baumbach movie to ever miss my best-of-the-year list, but that one has plenty of great moments; The Wedding Banquet puts its talented ensemble through sad-sack motions, too polite to go for laughs. 

Most welcome surprise: Relay

It shouldn’t be that surprising that David Mackenzie (Hell Or High Water) directed a taut paranoid thriller anchored by a rock-solid Riz Ahmed, playing an anonymous mediator between whistleblowers and nefarious corporations, and a charismatic Lily James. And yet we’re inundated with so many junky streaming thrillers, and so few non-prestige theatrical releases aimed at the adults in the room, that a big-screen thriller with involving characters, real locations, and a great hook (Ahmed’s character communicates primarily through a relay service designed for the deaf) feels like a godsend. The late-August theatrical release date was right on; audiences shrugging at such an entertaining late-summer ride, however, was a fumble.

Brianna Zigler

Top 15

1. Now You See Me: Now You Don’t
2. Cloud
3. Friendship
4. Evil Puddle
5. Weapons
6. April
7. Sinners
8. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You
9. Caught Stealing
10. The Naked Gun
11. Resurrection
12. One Battle After Another
13. Presence
14. The Ugly Stepsister
15. Misericordia

Outlier: Now You See Me: Now You Don’t

I genuinely don’t think anyone on the planet likes the Now You See Me movies as much as I do, but they scratch a ravenous itch that I can’t get anywhere else. And while, yes, Now You See Me: Now You Don’t should have been the name of the second film (this one should have been Now You 3 Me), it brings back tenfold all the franchise’s wacky sleight-of-hand hijinks, with my good friends the Four Horsemen now free from the dulling influence of Jon M. Chu (who is thankfully occupied with a lesser franchise). There is something so gleefully dumb, so knowingly absurd about these films, free of any wink-wink irony, and they keep that spirit strong in the third installment. The Now You See Me franchise knows it’s stupid, but it still earnestly wants you to buy into its world, and its greatest trick is that it’s so easy to say yes. In this world, a group of magicians steal from the rich and give to the poor through elaborate, multi-day magic acts on behalf of an ancient, secret organization. Magicians can join the FBI and make a career there for decades as part of an elaborate revenge scheme. Corrupt billionaires can be done in by card tricks. I left Now You See Me: Now You Don’t with the biggest grin on my face, having relished my brief reverie which posits a universe where magicians are unstoppable deities. It’s the universe I want to live in.

Most welcome surprise: The Naked Gun

I didn’t really like the original Naked Gun, and the trailer for this soft reboot was quite irritating and played before way too many movies. So, color me shocked that I ended up actually laughing my head off through the bulk of the runtime, a feeling I hadn’t experienced with a movie in a theater in a depressingly long time. But since comedy films are illegal now, who knows when this will happen again. The Naked Gun is probably the funniest comedy release in the past five years, and Akiva Schaffer in the director’s chair should’ve been assurance enough for me that I’d have a good time (much of the comedic sensibility aligns with what you might see in a Lonely Island joint, themselves assuredly inspired by ZAZ films). Sure, Liam Neeson and Pamela Anderson are great, but there’s less talk around Danny Huston’s performance, which is just as, if not more, comedically inspired than either of them. Huston’s Richard Cane doubling over in agony after one punch to the gut and whining to Drebin that “you hit the soft part of my belly” is the line read of the year.

Natalia Keogan

Top 15

1. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You
2. The Secret Agent
3. Sirat
4. One Battle After Another
5. Misericordia
6. Predators
7. The Testament Of Ann Lee
8. The Perfect Neighbor
9. Familiar Touch
10. Vulcanizadora
11. It Was Just An Accident
12. I’m Not Everything I Want To Be
13. The Chronology Of Water
14. Peter Hujar’s Day
15. Eephus