Typically with this section of my retrospective, I’ve tried to reflect on what the year gave us, and what it means for Hollywood moving forward. This year, I’m going to go in a different direction, and look at some of the people we lost over the year.
I’ll never forget the first time I watched a David Lynch film. It was 1997’s “Lost Highway”, and boy was I not prepared for what I saw. I loved the soundtrack- produced by Trent Reznor- and it was certainly interesting to watch, but it wasn’t until I rewatched it after “Mulholland Drive” came out that I started to vibe with it fully. I don’t love everything Lynch made, but I love his singular vision, and it’s fitting that his final gift for us was a performance in Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” as John Ford, in the role of an old master trying to impart wisdom to someone following in his footsteps. That was Lynch- regardless of how complex (or straightforward) his vision was, he was always wanting to teach us about humanity.
The details that came out of the passing of Gene Hackman and his wife have stayed with me all year. A victim of Alzheimer’s, Hackman’s final days sound like those of confusion and uncertainty. That is very much against the vision of the actor we have from his roles in films like “The French Connection”, “The Conversation”, “Unforgiven” or “The Firm”, which is probably one of my low-key favorite roles of his. In the last film, he plays a lawyer long corrupted by the firm that has ensnared Tom Cruise’s brilliant, idealistic young lawyer. Cocky, but taken aback by Mitch McDeere’s go for broke attitude. When he gets taken advantage of during Mitch’s last ditch attempt to break free of the firm, Hackman’s Avery Tollar is broken, but he can’t help but admire what Mitch has.
Michelle Trachtenberg will always be Dawn Summers from TV’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” before she will be any other character. Dawn’s life was one of challenges, born out of a supernatural need to be protected. I didn’t follow her career away from “Buffy” that extensively, but Sarah Michelle Gellar’s tribute to her TV sister after she passed away made me hurt for the way that unfortunately, there’s only so much people can be saved from in the real world when our bodies fail us.
Robert Redford is not really a name who, in my personal canon of film love, has meant a whole lot, but his 1992 family drama, “A River Runs Through It”, is one I do find myself going back to at times. A thoughtful look at two brothers whose lives run drastically separate from one another, but always recommune due to flyfishing, there’s a peace and beauty to the film that is the definition of comfort viewing. Whether it was his performances, his directorial efforts, and his activism for smaller films, Redford was a comfortable voice wanting a better world.
And then, there was December’s tragic murder of Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele. While his courtroom drama, “A Few Good Men” will always be my favorite of his to watch, I find myself continuously thinking about his 1986 Stephen King adaptation, “Stand By Me”, more. Very much crafted out of a desire to say something about childhood and growing up, it’s also about friendships that may move apart, but will always stay with us. As someone whose childhood was very much split in two when we moved to Georgia in 1988, this one has particular resonance when I think about the friends I left behind in Ohio.
I don’t know if any of the 200+ films I watched for 2025 will have the staying power with me that the ones I mentioned above- although in terms of TV, “Andor” is up there with “Buffy” in how much it impacted me- but 2025 has delivered a great variety of films that mean a lot to me, and that is what this blog is intended to celebrate.
Work, and life in general, kicked my ass hard when it came to press screenings, as well as keeping up with Sonic Cinema. My desktop kicked the bucket, so the podcast ended up on a 2-month hiatus. I had no “Repertory Revues” in either February or March. And it was everything I could do to keep up with new movies, let alone movies for the podcast, so some episodes continue to be pushed back. That said, I did get to cover the Renegade Film Festival and the Atlanta Film Festival yet again, and they were an embarrassment of riches. I took part in the Atlanta Film Critics Circle‘s 25 for 25 Best since 2000 voting, and was accepted to join the Southeastern Film Critics Association. All this while maintaining a full work load, going to all but one home games for Atlanta’s pro volleyball team, attending three weddings and saying goodbye to my mother, who passed away at the end of March. Oh, and I began a new series on the podcast about looking at fascism and authoritarianism in cinema. That I was able to do as well as I have been, that’s saying something.
Of course, I still have missed several films, though, including: “After the Hunt”; “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey”; “Caught Stealing”; “The Conjuring: Last Rites”; “Eephus”; “Emmanuelle”; “F1”; “Final Destination: Bloodlines”; “Frankenstein”; “Heart Eyes”; “Honey Don’t!”; “A House of Dynamite”; “In Your Dreams”; “Jay Kelly”; “John Candy: I Like Me”; “Keeper”; “Left-Handed Girl”; “The Life of Chuck”; “The Long Walk”; “Love Hurts”; “The Materialists”; “Megan 2.0”; “The Naked Gun”; “Presence”; “Resurrection”; “Sirat”; “The Testament of Ann Lee”; “Together”; “TRON: Ares”.
And with that, let us get going.
Favorite Films of 2025
Much like last year, I didn’t really start to finalize how my Favorites of 2025 would look until December. Part of that this year is how much I had to catch up with, but the truth is, this year didn’t get me quite as excited about the movies as much as previous years have. Yes, some late-year watches found their way on this list, but a lot of films you’d think I’d love just didn’t have the same juice as I anticipated. That being said, what a great, and varied, list this was.
=“Sinners” (Directed by Ryan Coogler)- In the end, nothing really came close to matching my excitement and the sheer filmmaking energy of Coogler’s Southern Gothic horror film. Featuring a great duel performance by Michael B. Jordan as twins who open a juke joint in their Mississippi hometown after being away for years, a superb supporting cast, a mythos-rich narrative, and the best soundtrack of 2025- which weaves effortlessly into the story of the film- Coogler’s original film has thrills, chills, dark humor and deep veins of emotion that stayed with me all year.
=“Hamnet” (Directed by Chloé Zhao)- Oscar-winner Zhao follows up “Nomadland” and “Eternals” with a beautifully made, richly emotional meditation on the nature of life, death, superstition, and the importance of creativity. When this film really grabbed me narratively, there was no letting go as we see the relationship between Agnes (Jessie Buckley) and Will (Paul Mescal) begin, and transform, and go through tragedy and catharsis in the span of two hours. This film rattled me.
=“Third Act” (Directed by Tadashi Nakamura)- My mother had just passed away at the end of March when Nakamura’s film played at the Atlanta Film Festival. In it, the director looks back at his father’s life as a powerful Asian American artist and activist, and deals with the reality of his current diagnosis that have him very much closer to the end of his life than the middle. It’s a love letter and a difficult goodbye that meant a great deal to me when I watched it, and when I had the chance to share my own journey with Nakamura after the screening.
=“Rebuilding” (Directed by Max Walker-Silverman)- “Rebuilding” is a film about uncertainty in the face of adversity. After a fire destroys land, a divorced father- along with others from the area- are trying to figure out the next steps when their land is seen as dangerous to build on. The choices writer-director Walker-Silverman (“A Love Song”) puts in front of Dusty (Josh O’Connor) are familiar and universal when change is facing us. This film just warmed my heart in a profound way; I loved every moment.
=“Superman” (Directed by James Gunn)- With all due respect to Brandon Routh and Henry Cavill, I have not felt this much hope when it comes to the Man of Steel on the big screen since Christopher Reeve. There’s an optimism to David Corenswet’s Superman that has been missing from the character for a long time. As Gunn begins his own version of the DC Universe, Superman must face a mysterious enemy that can seem to predict its every move; scrutiny of his motivations from the public; and self doubts about his own purpose when a message he thought he knew means something completely different. This was a superhero movie we needed this year.
=“Sunset and the Mockingbird” (Directed by Jyllian Gunther)- This 29-minute short film is a lot like “Third Act” in how it resonated with me after my mother passed away. My mother loved music, and loved singing. One of my favorite pleasures in the last few years of her life was when she would sing a song she knew when it was played, even if it seemed like her dementia should have passed it from her memory long ago. Similar occurrences happen in this film, as jazz pianist Junior Mance is diagnosed with dementia, and his wife- Gloria Claybourne- is trying to deal with it. Being able to connect with Claybourne after the screening in Atlanta was much-needed for me this year.
=“No Other Choice” (Directed by Park Chan-Wook)- I have been an admirer of Park Chan-Wook’s work since watching “Oldboy” in 2005, but I cannot say I was in love with any of his films the way other people were. With his adaptation of a Donald Westlake novel, The Ax, I found something to love. The story of a paper mill manager who’s struggling to find work after he’s been let go through downsizing, this wickedly funny drama finds honesty is a regular man’s challenge to keep his family afloat financially, while also trying to find a way to get ahead of his competition for a life-changing position. There’s honesty and wonderfully dark hilarity in this film as it unfolds that I can see myself returning to often over the years, a rare thing for me with a Park film.
=“Predator: Badlands” (Directed by Dan Trachtenberg)- Following up his acclaimed 2022 delving into the world of Predator in “Prey,” Trachtenberg actually took two swings at the franchise this year, first with the animated “Killer of Killers” anthology, and next with this big-screen return for the franchise. While the financials will determine if we get new Predator films in theatres, his unique story of a Predator youth trying to prove himself to a disappointed father- and his unique bond to a synthetic (played by Elle Fanning) on the planet he’s hunting on- took big swings that this life-long fan of the franchise loved watching unfold.
=“We Bury the Dead” (Directed by Zak Hilditch)- You’re actually going to get a look at this haunting zombie drama right out of the gates in 2026, as it’s slated for release two days after this blog comes out. I saw it as part of this year’s Atlanta Film Festival, and it was part of a run of films at the tail end of the festival that changed my perception of the festivities this year. Daisy Ridley stars as a young woman who is going to a hot zone for a zombie outbreak to help with the clean up, but she has ulterior motives, as her husband was in this area for business. While the film has some of the usual zombie madness, it’s really a film about reckoning with the past, and whether we can move beyond it for the future. And it further solidifies Ridley as a versatile talent to watch.
=“The Garden Sees Fire” (Directed by Kiera Faber– In a year where I had a number of meaningful connections at the Atlanta Film Festival, none quite matched the intellectual connection I found with animator/filmmaker Faber, whose 15-minute short played at the festival. Her film is a lovely, curious look at nature, destruction and rebirth, and fantasy; the conversation it jump-started between us was one of the most rewarding I’ve had with a filmmaker in my decade of interviews.
=“Eponymous” (Directed by Caroline Rumley)- What an unusual, fascinating documentary this is. Director Rumley looks at her in-laws’s history, which includes the creation of the first automatic machine gun (and the gun silencer), with an odd, idiocentric style to it where images are reused, but the narrative is always moving forward. If you have the chance to watch this, it’s well worth seeking out.
=“Close Friends” (Directed by Ellie Propp)- My favorite film of this year’s Renegade Film Festival finds a woman in the woods where an experience happened to her as a child. She is at a low ebb in her life, and her old demons come to visit. This hybrid of live action and animation is haunting, powerful and moving. It’s also on YouTube, if you’d like to watch it.
=“Baby Assassins 3” (Directed by Yugo Sakamoto)- Three films into the misadventures of teenage assassins Mahiro and Chisato and there’s no sign of diminishing returns in this action comedy franchise. Sakamoto understands action choreography in a way a lot of filmmakers do not, and he just lets leads Akari Takaishi and Saori Izawa have a blast bringing these characters to life. If you haven’t started to watch these movies already, I cannot recommend them enough.
=“When Fall is Coming” (Directed by François Ozon)- This era of Ozon’s is quickly turning the French filmmaker into one of my favorites. For his latest film, an elderly mother (Hélène Vincent) finds herself in a rift with her daughter after an accident; when her best friend’s son (Pierre Lottin) gets out of prison, there’s suddenly some surprising opportunities that come to pass to be with her grandson. This is a sly, compelling little thriller that’s more domestic drama than anything, and the way karma comes for people in the end. I love this little suspense story, and Ozon is really turning me into a fan.
=“Superboys of Malegaon (Directed by Reema Kagti)- This early year Indian film was one that really landed with me. It’s inspired by a true story about friends who- after years of watching great classics and their set pieces- decide to make a film of their own. Part low-budget filmmaking comedy in the vein of “Bowfinger” and “Ed Wood,” part creative class drama, and part story of friendship, “Superboys” was a film seemingly made for me, and it was a case of a movie coming at the right time- hopeful, human, heartfelt.
=“Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere” (Directed by Scott Cooper)- When I first watched the film, this was not a slam dunk to be among my favorite films of the year. I love Bruce Springsteen’s music completely, but this film- which looks at the turbulent time when he was creating his acoustic classic, “Nebraska”- didn’t bowl me over the way past biopics did. That said, there’s something about the way Cooper etches the Boss’s creative process on the record, and his friendship/collaboration with Jon Landau, that has stayed with me. This was a winner for me.
=“Color Book” (Directed by David Fortune)- The opening night movie of this year’s Atlanta Film Festival, Fortune’s drama has a father struggling to do right by his son- who has Down Syndrome. In the moment of the film, that involves taking him to his first baseball game. There’s a beauty to the way Fortune tells this story that stayed with me for a while after watching it. If you have the chance to see it, it’s well worth taking in.
=“Good Girls Get Fed” (Directed by Kelly Lou Dennis)- This short film was from my favorite short film block of the year- specifically, from the Renegade Film Festival- and apparently, filmmaker Kelly Lou Dennis will be turning it into a feature film. A look at three women whom are being held captive, this film looks at toxic masculinity and how women fight back against it when they are given a brief opening at freedom. I cannot wait to see what the feature looks like.
=“Blue Moon” (Directed by Richard Linklater)- It’s a shame that Linklater has never really broken through as a popular filmmaker. He’s certainly one of the most celebrated of the ’90s auteurs, but he hasn’t been able to accomplish much commercial success. This year, he had two terrific films about artists- the second being Netflix’s “Nouvelle Vague”- but this one was easily my favorite of the two. Taken from letters between lyricist Lorenz Hart and Elizabeth Weiland (played by a rarely-better Ethan Hawke and an elegant Margaret Qualley), “Blue Moon” has Hart in Sardi’s bar following the debut of his former collaborator’s latest musical opening. Hawke commands the screen in a performance that is mournful and energetic in spades, and he’s given a great cast around him. This is one of Linklater’s very best, which is a high bar to clear.
=“The Old Woman with the Knife” (Directed by Min Kyu-dong)- This action thriller really connected with me. An aging assassin finds herself in the orbit of a rookie assassin, but as their bond deepens, so does the reality of why their connection feels so deep. Led by a fantastic performance by Lee Hye-young, this movie is exciting, with some terrific set pieces, but it’s the film’s emotional pull that won me over.
=“Black Phone 2” (Directed by Scott Derrickson)- Derrickson has become one of my favorite genre filmmakers over the years, especially when it comes to his collaborations with writer C. Robert Cargill. In their sequel to their 2022 hit horror film, they take some big swings as Finney and Gwen continue to find themselves haunted by The Grabber. But I thought he died in the first film? The chances the filmmakers take pay off with rich emotional moments, as well as some tense horror moments to go along with deepening style choices. This is a new favorite horror franchise for me.
=“Oh, Hi!” (Directed by Sophie Brooks)- This wicked dark comedy from co-writer/director Brooks takes a compelling direction from a straightforward premise- what if you’re in different places in the relationship, and you want to change their mind? The way that unfolds between Molly Gordon’s Iris and Logan Lerman’s Issac is devious and surprising and some of the most fun I had watching a movie this year.
=“Lone Samurai” (Directed by Josh C. Waller)- I’ve seen so many samurai films that clock two hours plus over the past few years that Waller’s economical 96 minutes kind of surprised me. There’s a lot packed in to that 96 minutes, though, as a samurai is shipwrecked, and what begins as a fight for survival from his personal demons becomes a physical fight when a bloodthirsty tribe inhabits the island. This film is a story told in two halfs, but I find myself loving the whole, and how it makes its way to its finale.
=“Highest 2 Lowest” (Directed by Spike Lee)- Spike Lee is a filmmaker I find great more than a personal favorite, but his latest film just hit me right. A remake of Kurosawa’s “High to Low,” Lee reunites with Denzel Washington for this kidnapping thriller that is not only his most nakedly genre film since their last film together- 2006’s “Inside Man”- but also looks at an old music titan who is forced into an impossible choice when a kidnapping plot goes sideways. There are some all-time great acting moments for Washington here, and Lee is firing on all cylinders as his protagonist tries to navigate the moral complexities of his various situations right now. This one is a gem from both actor and filmmaker.
=“Spinal Tap II: The End Continues” (Directed by Rob Reiner)- While there were a couple of other films I saw this year I felt were better films, in the end, Reiner’s final film- his legacy sequel to his iconic mockumentary- felt right as the final film to add to this list. It’s the one I’m most likely to watch again in the future, and in light on unspeakable tragedy in how we lost the director, it made me smile in how it followed the iconic band as they get together for one, final show. A classic? Absolutely not. But it was a movie that simply made me happy, and meant something to me, and that’s honestly what this list is all about.
As the process of getting my 25 favorites commenced, there were some films that- I would come to realize- would be natural choices for being just outside of that list. Here are the 10 films that occupy my “Eleventh Place” slot: “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”, Mary Bronstein’s tense psychological thriller with a riveting Rose Byrne as a mother coming apart at the seems; “Predator: Killer of Killers”, the animated anthology that bridged the gap between “Prey” and the aforementioned “Predator: Badlands”; “Saturday Ritual”, a delightful horror comedy about three friends and their Saturday morning routine from Sydne Horton; “11 Rebels”, an exciting, brutal “Seven Samurai” riff about inmates who have to defend a fortress against an Imperial army; “KPop Demon Hunters”, Netflix’s colorful, energetic horror musical about a group of women juggling demon hunting and worldwide fame; “Jurassic World: Rebirth”, a soft reboot of the dinosaur franchise that had energy and visual creativity to go with its dinosaur nonsense; “It Ends”, a compelling psychological thriller about friends on a trip who find themselves on a road to nowhere; “Orwell 2+2=5”, a fascinating documentary that uses Orwell’s own words to recognize the authoritarian tendencies of our modern times; “Dear Stranger”, an unusual but intriguing kidnapping thriller about a couple torn apart when their son is kidnapped; and “Hidden Face”, a pulpy and entertaining erotic thriller with a twist.
Before we move on, here are 25 more features and shorts that made a lasting impression with me, or I just enjoyed watching, in 2025: “28 Years Later”; “Avatar: Fire and Ash”; “Ballerina: From the World of John Wick”; “Black Girls & Fairytales”; “Captain America: Brave New World”; “The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie”; “The Fantastic 4: First Steps”; “Good Boy”; “Hedda”; “It Was Just an Accident”; “Natchez”; “Nouvelle Vague”; “One Battle After Another”; “The Perfect Neighbor”; “Sentimental Value”; “Sorry”; “Sorry, Baby”; “Thunderbolts*”; “To a Land Unknown”; “Torn: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on New York City Streets”; “Unknown Number: The High School Catchfish”; “The Villagers”; “The Voice of Hind Rajab”; “Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery”; “Yadang: The Snitch”
Favorite Soundtracks of 2025
As with last year, this year in soundtracks was kind of iffy in a lot of ways for me. Granted, part of that came from the fact that the best one of 2025 came so early in the year, but while there were certainly a lot that I enjoyed listening to, were they ones that inspired me like the best ones do? That’s a harder sell.
The truth of the matter was, every other soundtrack this year was chasing the otherworldly combination of songs and Ludwig Göransson’s score we got in Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners”. Music is such a foundational part of that film’s landscape that the soundtrack had to be an event in and of itself, and in their latest collaboration, Coogler and two-time Oscar winner Göransson delivered in spades with a genre-blending musical work that is- quite possibly- one of the best combinations of song and score we’ve ever gotten.
As the months went on, however, a few other soundtracks came out that I found myself loving. For “Hamnet”, Max Richter might have crafted my favorite straight-up orchestral score of the year, even though one of the most emotional moments of the film is scored with his well-known “On the Nature of Daylight” (which has also been used by “Shutter Island” and “Arrival” over the years). For Nia DaCosta’s dizzying period drama, “Hedda”, Oscar winner Hildur Guðnadóttir composed a score that spans a wide variety of genres and tones to get to the psychological tensions of the film. And leave it to Danny Boyle to return to the director’s chair of the zombie franchise he started with “28 Years Later”, and find another original way of combining songs and score together in a collaboration with the Young Fathers. Rounding out my Top 5 is a full-bore kick-ass piece of action scoring from Benjamin Wallfisch and Sarah Schachner for “Predator: Badlands”.
Those five stand out so high above the rest, I could probably just leave it at that, but then that would mean not mentioning the pop-infused delight of the songs from “KPop Demon Hunters”; John Murphy and David Fleming’s heroic work for “Superman”; the emotional, subtle beauty of Jake Xerxes and James Elkington’s score for “Rebuilding”; Bryce Dressner’s striking score for the visual tone poem of a man’s life, “Train Dreams”; Atticus Derrickson’s tense electronic score for “Black Phone 2”; the thrilling action music for “11 Rebels” by Kenta Matsukuma; Son Lux’s exciting and emotionally-grounded work for Marvel’s “Thunderbolts*”, and Michael Giacchino’s classically comic book score for “The Fantastic 4: First Steps”. Finally, we finish with the soundtrack to Spike Lee’s “Highest 2 Lowest”, another song/score hybrid where both types of music matter in how the final film impacts us.
Favorite Performances of 2025
As I work on thinking about my favorite performances of this year, that’s when how breathtaking 2025 at the movies was. With the movies mentioned above of what I could still see, I feel like there’s more that could be added. But this year was pretty top-loaded with great acting.
In terms of the very best work of the year, that’s a tough call. I loved Michael B. Jordan‘s dual performances as Smoke and Stack, as well as Miles Caton as their musically-inspired cousin, in “Sinners” (also a shout-out to Wunmi Mosaku and Delroy Lindo for their fantastic supporting work). Can you tell how much I loved Ryan Coogler’s film this year? That movie just rocked me in every way- it was a complete film. But this is about individual performances. Among my very favorite are Ethan Hawke as the longing lyricist Lorenz Hart in Richard Linklater’s “Blue Moon”, and Tessa Thompson as the scheming hostess of Nia DaCosta’s “Hedda”. In catching up with “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”, Rose Byrne’s tense, anxious performance as a frazzled mother blew me away with her work, in a similar way that I was captivated by Denzel Washington as the slick music mogul in “Highest 2 Lowest”; they both actually shared a co-star in A$AP Rocky, who does strong work in both. As an auto mechanic who thinks he finds his one-time torturer, Vahid Mobasseri is riveting in “It Was Just an Accident”. Meanwhile, Motaz Malhees and Saja Kilani are unforgettable as call center operators trying to help a young girl caught in the middle of war in “The Voice of Hind Rajab”.
Those are all the most noteworthy for me, but not only the ones I loved. There’s Josh O’Connor, who had three great performances this year, but resonated strongest with me in “Rebuilding”. My favorite actress from last year, Daisy Ridley, did powerful work as a woman searching for answers in “We Bury the Dead”. In “Hamnet”, Jessie Buckley shows the power of a mother’s love, and Paul Mescal channels grief into art. Lee Byung-hun is a husband and father trying to get ahead in a brutal job market in “No Other Choice”, and William Catlett is a father trying to do right by his Down Syndrome son in “Color Book”. As friends trying to help each other through their disparate lives, writer-director Eva Victor and Naomi Ackie do stellar, emotional work in “Sorry, Baby”. In “When Fall is Coming”, Hélène Vincent is great as a grandmother trying to see her grandson for the summer, and Pierre Lottin is compelling as the family friend who may have helped it happen. Jeremy Strong does great work as a producer trying to understand his artist’s thinking in “Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere”, and Molly Gordon is excellent as a young woman who’s trying to land her man in “Oh, Hi!”. And I cannot forget the excellent work by Stellan Skarsgård, Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas in “Sentimental Value” or Leonardo DiCaprio, Chase Infiniti or Benicio Del Toro in “One Battle After Another”. And from more genre fare, David Corenswet, Rachel Brosnahan and Nicholas Hoult brought a new vision of “Superman” to life, while Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi and Elle Fanning made an unlikely, entertaining duo in “Predator: Badlands”; Florence Pugh brought an uncertain superhero to clarity in “Thunderbolts*”; and Alfie Williams was a great lead in “28 Years Later”. There are more I could have listed, but all lists have to stop, and so it does with mine…until next year.
Viva La Resistance!
Brian Skutle
www.sonic-cinema.com
