Vic’s Top 20 Films of 2025 - a magical year at the cinema

For me, 2025 was a terrific year for film-watching, not least because I watched far more films than in any of the past ten years, having viewed over 80 films released in 2025 (including film-festival films that won’t be released until this year). The overall quality of those films was exceptional (I don’t believe I have ever awarded four stars to thirteen films in one year), thus making it necessary to do a top-20 list this year.

Last year, I wrote a very long introduction to my top-films list due to the ‘revelation’ that I seem to appreciate darker films far more than lighter films. Perhaps that revelation contributed to the even bigger revelation I experienced in 2025 (with Walter’s help), namely that I seem to watch films primarily with the right hemisphere of my brain. This helps to explain why so many of my favourite films over the years are not critically acclaimed and why some critically-acclaimed films (e.g. 2025’s One Battle After Another) don’t make it on my list at all. I can appreciate a well-made film for its technical merits, but I’m more interested in how a film engages me and moves me. Specifically, I'm looking first and foremost for magical films that nourish my soul.

For those less familiar with the left-brain/right-brain concept, here’s a brief definition (based on a post by Walter): The left side of our brains focuses on logic, analysis, words, details and making sense of things, while the right side helps us understand our experiences, emotions and the complex interconnected world around us. (Walter writes: “Our right brains provide us with a more reliable view of reality in all of its unique diversity and complexity, and they interact more directly and richly with our intuition and imagination.”) 

One of the primary ways to engage the right side of my brain is through music, which is why I love musicals so much (thus the frequent presence of musicals on my top-film lists). Four of my top sixteen films of 2025 which were ignored by critics were either musicals or about music. But many of the films I describe as ‘pure movie magic’ or with the word ‘WOW!” have engaged me (often described as ‘blown me away’) for reasons I find impossible to define. My favourite film of 2025 is the epitome of such a magical film for me. 

The critical favourite of 2025 (One Battle After Another) is an example of a film that failed to engage me despite being a well-made on-point satire. Reasons for this include too much action and violence and the character of Lockjaw, who was well-played by Sean Penn but so off-putting that I couldn’t watch him even in a satire. Marty Supreme was another critical favourite in 2025. It was also very well-made but failed to engage me.

Almost making my list were two films made by women: Chloe Zhao’s  Hamnet, which won the Golden Globe for drama film and for Jessie Buckley’s terrific performance - there was much I liked and it had a great ending, but the music used for that ending was too familiar (it was used in Arrival, one of my all-time faves) and thus distracting; and Kelly Reichardt’s The Mastermind, which featured one of two great performances by Josh O’Connor last year.

I watched quite a few documentaries in 2025 but didn’t know how to fit them into my list. My favourites of those I watched were Come And See Me in the Good Light and Antidote. 

The only 2025 film I wish I’d been able to see before writing this post is The Secret Agent, a Brazilian film that won the Golden Globe for Best International Feature (and Best Actor) and would likely have made my list.

Finally, let’s talk about Netflix, which had an astounding three films in my top nine films of 2025. That would be an outstanding achievement deserving the highest praise except for one horrific detail: Because these films were Netflix Originals, none of them were allowed to spend more than a handful of days in theatres before streaming on Netflix. This is a travesty, as all of these films (Wake Up Dead Man, Frankenstein, Train Dreams) deserve to be watched on the largest screens available (I was fortunately able to watch the first two of these at the cinema).

Speaking of Wake Up Dead Man and Frankenstein, I watched both of those films, along with It Was Just an Accident, for the second time over a period of 36 hours. All three of those films end with the ‘bad guy’ receiving grace from the protagonist. This is both an incredible coincidence and the primary reason why all three of these films are in my top seven films of the year.

Other observations on the list below:

1. A quarter of my top-20 films were made by women and over half of them featured a woman protagonist.

2. Five of my top eleven films are in a language other than English, including two German films in my top ten and two Iranian films in my top eleven.

3. Directors Richard Linklater, Rian Johnson and Wes Anderson continue to regularly get films on my lists.

4. Andrew Scott plays a supporting role in two of my top six films, and Chiwetel Ejiofor has key roles in two of my top fifteen films.

5. I watched almost half of these films at a film festival. Longer mini-reviews of these films can be found in my previous festival-highlights posts (I have indicated this with TIFF or EIFF).

6. While my lists regularly overlap with those of Gareth Higgins, my film critic friend, this year was extraordinary, with six of Gareth’s top ten films in my top ten and eight in my top eighteen (most of these were on my list before I saw Gareth’s list, but two of them were only watched because of his recommendation). 

And here’s the list, counting down. This year, I will begin each mini-review with the name of the director. Note that I just watched the first film on the list, thus the tie at number 20.

20. If I Had Legs, I’d Kick You  - Dir: Mary Bronstein - This film is so intense, I had to take a break in the middle to relax before finishing. That’s a good thing! Rose Byrne delivers an Oscar-worthy performance as a mother trying to survive through one crisis after another.

20. Nika & Madison - Dir: Eva Thomas - Another excellent Canadian Indigenous film. Two young women on the run from the Ontario police may sound like a thriller but I would describe it as a drama with things to say. (EIFF)

19. The Phoenician Scheme - Dir: Wes Anderson - Another typically quirky and thoroughly entertaining film from Anderson. A second viewing is likely necessary (it was for me) to pick up all the nuances of the story and its message. Benicio Del Toro and Mia Threapleton are terrific.

18. Sorry, Baby - Dir: Eva Victor - A gorgeous dark-comedy drama about a professor (played by Eva Victor) trying to recover from the trauma of sexual assault. Victor does an incredible job of acting, writing and directing. 

17. The President’s Cake - Dir: Hasan Hadi - A deeply sad, but often funny, film about a young girl in 1990s Baghdad who’s searching for the ingredients to make a birthday cake for Saddam Hussein (for school). The cinematography and the acting of the children are extraordinary. (TIFF)

16. The Ballad of Walis Island - Dir: James Griffiths - Wonderful British comedy-drama about a lottery-winner who invites a folk-music duo to perform on his remote island. Tom Basden and Tim Key wrote and starred in the film (Carey Mulligan also stars), which features great music as well as lots of laughs. This will be a lot higher on Walter’s list.

15. Eleanor the Great - Dir: Scarlett Johansson - Johansson’s directorial debut features the amazing June Squibb as Eleanor, an old woman who pretends to be a Holocaust survivor after the death of her close friend (who was a Holocaust survivor). The relationship between Eleanor and college student Nina Davis (Erin Kellyman) is what makes the film special. Chiwetel Ejiofor rounds out a terrific cast as Nina’s father. (TIFF)

14. The End - Dir: Joshua Oppenheimer - Not for everyone, this was magical for me because it’s a unique musical set in an underground bunker after an environmental disaster. While the singing (which is all done live) is uneven, the ensemble cast (featuring Tilda Swinton, Michael Shannon, George MacKay and Moses Ingram) is terrific and the story is thought-provoking.

13. Black Bag - Dir: Stephen Soderbergh - Soderbergh’s latest is a brilliant (if a bit too cold), intelligent, old-fashioned spy thriller with incredible cinematography and spot-on performances by Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett as British spies who are married to each other. 

12, A Little Prayer - Dir: Angus MacLachlan - This 2023 film wasn’t widely released until 2025, so it gets on my list. What a beautiful indie gem, perfectly written by MacLachlan and superbly acted by David Strathairn and Jane Levy as a father-in-law and daughter-in-law at a time of family crisis. 

11. The Seed of the Sacred Fig - Dir: Mohammad Rasoulof - Rasoulof had to flee Iran to avoid prison after secretly filming this masterpiece in Tehran. A powerful and devastating film about the family of an investigating judge breaking apart during a nationwide protest in a country suffering under political repression. Too timely.

10. Sound of Falling - Masha Schilinski - This mesmerizing German drama concerns four generations of women living in the same house in the north of former East Germany. Profound and moving, if sometimes confusing, this film features authentic acting and unique and gorgeous cinematography. (EIFF)

9. Train Dreams - Dir: Clint Bentley - This haunting, quiet, meditative (Terrence-Malick-like) film might have been higher on my list if I could have watched it in a cinema, but no such opportunity was provided. Joel Edgerton is amazing as Robert Grainier, a logger and railroad worker in Idaho during the first half of the 20th century. Prominent film critic Brian Tallerico describes it as “a meditation on the beauty of everyone and everything.” Enough said.

8. Köln 75 - Dir: Ido Flug - Not a critical favourite (critics have trouble with biopics and musicals and this is a biopic full of music). I likely would have missed it entirely without Gareth’s recommendation. For me, it was anything but a typical biopic. I found every moment of its story of the 18-year-old Vera Brandes (played wonderfully by Mala Emde) organizing a Keith Jarrett concert in Köln in 1975 to be captivating and irresistible. 

7. Frankenstein - Dir: Guillermo del Toro - What can I say? Since reading Mary Shelley’s novel in my teens, I’ve been a fan of almost every Frankenstein film. This faithful yet original adaptation was awesome to watch on the big screen. It felt like an old-fashioned epic. The cinematography was gorgeous, the acting by Jacob Elordi, Oscar Isaac and Mia Goth was excellent, and the emphasis on grace and forgiveness was moving and profound. If only the film hadn’t been so graphically violent (that the creature is both kind and violent makes sense, but his violence doesn’t have to be so graphic), it might have been higher on my list.

6. Wake Up Dead Man - Dir: Rain Johnson - By far the best of Johnson’s Knives Out films, this one is captivating and entertaining from the first minute to the last. Josh O’Connor steals the film as a young priest suspected of killing his domineering monsignor (played by Josh Brolin). Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig, terrific as always) is called in to investigate. The church setting allows this film to explore theological themes (like grace and forgiveness) and it does so very well. The Gothic feel is a delightful addition.

5. It Was Just an Accident - Dir: Jafar Panahi - Winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes, this humanizing Iranian dark-comedy drama has a superb ensemble cast and marvellous thought-provoking dialogue that dances beautifully around the themes of torture, revenge and the cycle of violence. Like Rasoulof, Panahi has been arrested a number of times and has spent years in prison. He also had no permission to make this film. Despite the ongoing repression, Iranian filmmakers are among the best in the world. (EIFF)

4. Sentimental Value - Dir: Joachim Trier - Renate Reinsve plays Nora, a stage actor struggling with anxiety after the death of her mother and the sudden return of her director father, Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård is sublime and his Golden Globe is well-deserved). The character development was so deep, the dialogue so thoughtful, the story so rich and beautifully told, and the acting by all four leads (including Elle Fanning and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) so strong  that, for me, this was THE masterpiece of of 2025. A work of art. (TIFF)

3. Blue Moon - Dir: Richard Linklater - My second viewing caused this film to jump up a few notches on my list because, like my two favourites of the year, Blue Moon is pure movie magic. Ethan Hawke delivers his best performance as Lorenz Hart, who was Richard Rodgers’s lyricist before Oscar Hammerstein II. A great supporting cast includes Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale and Andrew Scott (as Rodgers). Most of the film takes place in real time in a Manhattan bar on March 31, 1943, the opening night of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!. The nonstop dialogue is brilliant, the atmosphere is perfect and I was captivated for every single second of this film. Richard Linklater just continues to amaze. (EIFF)

2. Kiss of the Spider Woman - Dir: Bill Condon - My favourite two films of the year received mixed reviews and were largely ignored by viewers, but for me they were also pure movie magic. Based on the 1992 stage musical, which was based on the 1976 novel by Manuel Puig and the 1985 film, it takes place in an Argentinian prison in the early 1980s, during a military dictatorship. Diego Luna plays Valentin, a revolutionary leader sharing a cell with Molina (played by Tonatiuh Elizarraraz), a gay window dresser (arrested for being gay) who will be set free if he can get Valentin to divulge the names of his fellow revolutionaries. I loved every minute of this film, from the glorious and gorgeous musical numbers to the intense life-transforming conversations in the jail cell. Tonatiuh is a revelation, Luna is perfect and Jennifer Lopez is wonderful in her three roles (including that of the Spider Woman). (EIFF)

1. The Life of Chuck - Dir: Mike Flanagan - I have already written at length about my favourite film of this great film year, so I’ll keep this short. The life of Chuck is revealed in the most unique and intriguing ways possible. I’ve already watched it five times and still find something new each time. For me, as I said in the beginning, this is the epitome of pure movie magic: a film that grabs hold of me in its opening minute and never lets go, despite being intentionally confusing. Every scene speaks to me. This life-affirming and life-transforming masterpiece will not please everyone the way it did me, but in my three years as coordinator of the St. Andrews Film Society (we show two films a month), no film has received a more enthusiastic response and almost everyone stayed for a long discussion afterwards.