10 Favorite Movies of 2025

Because every year of fun new art is worth celebrating, I'm picking out my ten favorite movies from 2025.

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Scott's Self-Indulgent Movie Podcast · Episode 1057: 10 Favorite Movies of 2025

2025 was a surprisingly good year for movies, while also being one of the most frustrating. We saw the number of female-directed movies crater while oft-despised genres like horror turned into industry shapers. We saw plenty of fun/new directions for blockbuster fare like superhero movies, while most of the trades continued to rail against their allegedly middling box office haul and giant budgets. And we also had solid sequels hit theaters the same year a bunch of disappointing movies clocked in as well.

Personally this year was the year I rediscovered my love of going to the theater, seeing more movies on the big screen than I've seen in years, which was a lot fun.

And because every year of fun new art is worth celebrating, I'm picking out my ten favorite movies from 2025. As always, this is based on the movie's I've seen of time of writing which means there's a number of awards contenders like Marty Supreme and The Mastermind or critical darlings like Sorry, Baby.

But before we get to the main list, we gotta get to the honorable mentions:

This was a surprisingly good year for comedies with a bunch of unexpected gems squeaking through the studio system without getting turned into TV shows. Admittedly two of the biggest success stories in the genre with sequels or reboots, but when they're as willfully silly as The Naked Gun and Freakier Friday it's hard to complain. And even comedy for adults came through with misdaventurous fun like One of Them Days and genre-bending laughs from movies like Borderline.

On the action movie side of the tracks we had an appropriately giant send-off for Tom Cruise's Mission Impossible franchise with Final Reckoning, a furiously fun re-imagining of the Predator movie setup with Predator: Badlands, Russians swapped in for Nazi cannon fodder in Sisu: Road to Revenge, a gonzo gimmick movie with Novocaine and two of Marvel's best movies in some time with Thunderbolts* and Fantastic Four: First Steps.

Movies for adults made their presence known with gems like Steven Soderbergh's romantic spy thriller Black Bag, more Wes Anderson whimsy with The Phoenician Scheme, and an epic dark comedy from Paul Thomas Anderson with the relevant as ever One Battle After Another.

But this might've been horror's year with a bevy of hits and gems all hitting theaters and streaming including the co-dependent body horror of Together, a long awaited horror sequel that actually worked with 28 Years Later, the pitch black humor of The Monkey with a delicious dual role for Theo James, and V/H/S Halloween bringing some new blood to remind everyone why the anthology approach works so well in the genre. And with all of that out of the way, let's talk my favorites.

KPop Demon Hunters

Whenever something becomes an instant success with kids the world over, there's a desire to walk back praise for it. It's just a kids movie. Or, it's a silly movie with some fun songs for the whole family. Hell you could even argue that the movie simply capitalized on the surging popularity of anime by using a number of the genre's most familiar tropes.

But that's selling this animated gem short as it does a Disney movie better than Disney has done them in a few years. We've colorful eye-popping action sequences, great bits of physical comedy (I still love that blue tiger), and the most popular pop soundtrack of the year.

And if you can pepper in a good message about being honest with the people you love so you can face down the world's dangers most effectively together, all the better.

One of my favorite measures so family entertainment are parents, since they typically end up watching these movies and shows and listening to these songs on a loop. 

And to broadly quote them: this one's good.

Train Dreams

I haven't had the chance to review Clint Bentley's tone poem of a movie and honestly, I might not be able to. Following a logger Robert Granier, played to somber perfection by Joel Edgerton, throughout his life a rapidly evolving America, the movie functions as both a snapshot of America's past and Granier's life as he works, falls in love and experiences loss.

What I find so fascinating is how each of the movie's stylist elements make it special and also make it so difficult to pin down. The use of the 4:3 aspect ratio makes it feel like a snapshot of a bygone era, like a moving photograph from history. While our narrator is omniscient, weaving in hints of what's to come, and what's already happened into the story playing out on screen. Every bit of technology and event on-screen, whether heartfelt or violent, on screen feels period appropriate. While we also have dreams that play out like reality. A movie deeply defined by grief, but also the importance of community and connection.

Hence why the movie has been described as both "intimate" and "mythic" at the same time. A movie that invokes the emotional weight of a Terrence Mallick movie while carving out an identity all its own.

No Other Choice

Park Chan-wook leans into heavy as hell absurdity with this dark comedy about a desperate paper mill manager who finds a not-so-elegant solution to his losing his job. Kill his competition.

Is this a bitterly funny movie that skewers the disempowerment inherent to modern capitalism? Yes. Is this a series of criminal misadventures with one of South Korea's most pre-eminent leading men playing wildly against type? Also yes. Is it a deep-dive into the collapse of one man's ego in the face of losing his "dream job"? You betcha.

Managing these wildly differing tones and elements is what makes this movie so special as the audience witnesses Lee Byung-hun's Man-su bumble his way back to the life he used to have by any means necessary. Some scenes feature nothing but razor's edge tension. Some are tragic. Others are pure physical comedy. All with Lee Byung-hun adapting his sad sack performance on a dime and Park's subtle by always effective shot selection capturing the intended emotion of each moment.

It's a brutally affecting story of a man so blinded by a single goal that their plans and biggest faults, even ones Man-su can readily identify in the men he's taking out one by one, that he literally can't see another way forward or another way to be happy.

Weapons

Zach Cregger's sophomore outing feels both bigger and more intimate, as we watch a town and those directly affected, turn themselves inside out searching for answers when an entire grade school class goes missing, save for one boy.

As a horror movie it's utterly terrifying both in concept and visuals whether it's how the children run (in that very intentional and unnatural looking way), individual scenes draped in mysteries that only have bad answers, or even the baseline concept of children seemingly missing without reason, all at once, without a trace.

As a narrative, the movie deftly uses its split narrative to consistently recontextualize our assumed series of events or theories, only to end with another dreadful question unanswered. All being lived-out by achingly human characters wading through their faults and frequently failing to connect or get any closer to answers.

It's also hilarious, whether it's our villain who literally looks like a woman in clown makeup or individual character reactions to their own psyches messing with them.

As an emotional experience, however, this is where the movie really gets me as a messy-as-hell reflection on grief and our deep desire for answers in the face of unimaginable tragedy. Ones that don't have clean resolutions even after all of the puzzle pieces have been put together. Because sometimes...you're just not the same...and that's ok.

The Long Walk

Considering the movie's premise, a group of 50 young men have to keep walking or be shot for a contest with only one winner, it might seem strange to call this movie humanist. But I can't think of a more apt description for Francis Lawrence's impactful adaptation of Stephen King's dystopian story.

By focusing on the young men walking vs. the society at large or even the villains, the movie revels in the boy's connections. How they support one another. Motivate each other. Operate in solidarity together. And sometimes, even resist together. Each death proving that the villain is the system that makes each of these young men desperate or angry enough to enter this competition in the first place.

That's before we get to a collection of stand-out performances including Cooper Hoffman providing a satisfying and heartbreaking emotional arc, Judy Greer's deeply traumatic 2-3 performance, and a collection of charming and oft-putting turns from Garrett Wareing, Tut Nyout, Charlie Plumer and more.

And then there's David Jonsson's who's Pete McVries is a miraculous slow burn of a performance that the entire cast and plot pivot around. A deeply affecting demonstration of the power of quiet kindness.

I called this movie the "best bad time" I had watching a movie this year, and I still think the label sticks. Achingly sad, but loaded with hope in humans dependence on one another to survive.

Frankenstein

The child-like glee coming off of this movie is absolutely infectious as Guillermo del Toro provides perhaps the most impactful take on Mary Shelley's classic tale since the original days of the Universal monsters. 

Does what I described as "God-tier production design" help? Of course. As does a cast that embraces the movie's high camp including a never more energetic Oscar Issac (compliment) who also somehow voids much of his vaunted charisma, Jacob Elordi's excellent physical performance as the creature, and a collection of supporting players including Mia Goth and Christoph Waltz playing their parts to the rafters. Every costume is immaculate and every visual is loaded with meaning and splendor.

That's all of the stuff I come to expect del Toro along with his enthusiasm for monsters as characters.

The special sauce in this one is actually thematic. With a couple of pointed changes to the source material, del Toro turns our titular mad scientist from an irresponsible man defined by hubris into the year's best bad dad, who is so obsessed with escaping the shadow of his own bad father that he becomes something worse. A damning indictment of men like Frankenstein who define themselves as victims and subsequently victimize everyone around them.

Men would rather stitch together a man made out of corpse parts and reanimate it with lightning than go to therapy apparently.

Companion

In a year where AI became a ubiquitous part of daily life, whether we asked for it or not, Companion served as a great reminder that the real monsters are always human, not machine. Saying much more might spoil the fun, but rest-assured, this movie only felt more timely as 2025 evolved.

What starts off as a seemingly standard issue thriller, a bunch of friends at a cabin in the woods and someone is killed, quickly pivots into an incisive look at human insecurity and what it really means to be human.

Writer/director Drew Hancock moves the plot along at a lightning pace quickly introducing and incorporating new twists almost as quickly as he shifts between genres going from to rom-com to darkly funny thrills, often in a single sequence.

The cast are all perfectly suited to their roles with genre standout Sophie Thatcher bringing us a great merger of pathos and rage, Jack Quaid loudly inverting his nice guy image and Harvey Guillen and Lukas Gage stealing the show.

All of which comes in a potent package that highlights the deep-rooted insecurity and selfishness behind so many allegedly good men.

The Parenting

This underseen gem didn't seem to wow critics. And I have no idea why because it is an absolute delight. Here's the pitch. Imagine a Meet The Parents-type movie for queer men and making it a horror comedy. In it, the uptight Rohan and the good-hearted Midwestern boy bring their parents to an old mansion to meet each other, before one of them proposes, when a ghost decides to wreak havoc by possessing one of the parents.

What follows is a campy as hell good time as this misfit band work through their differences, uncover what the hell is happening, and try to purge this spectre before someone ends up dead.

And while are leads are perfectly odd couple, in great turns from Brandon Flynn and Nik Dodani, the movie understandably leans heavily on a murder's row of a supporting cast with Brian Cox and Edi Falco as Rohan's posh upper crust family and Dean Norris and Lisa Kudrow bringing Midwestern descentcand silliness to the whole affair.

And that's before we add in livewire performances from Parker Posey and Vivian Bang as our romantic pair's chaotic bestie Sara.

Equal parts spooky (in a fun way), silly and heartfelt and a heckuva good time.

Wake Up Dead Man

Rian Johnson's latest Knives Out mystery features the hallmarks of the genre. An impossible crime. A talented cast inhabiting a fascinating group of characters. And our caricature of a detective swooping in to put the pieces together in a grandiose and bemusing fashion. 

But what makes this movie stand out, even amongst the last two Benoit Blanc films, is how pointed, personal and inspired the film's themes are. Diving headfirst into debates about faith vs. reason, different visions for what faith's function should be, and what forgiveness, mercy and even God's love actually looks like.

What does that mean for the audience?  

It means that everything we've come to expect from Johnson and company, including an impeccably cast and acted collection of suspects, a roller coaster ride between melodrama and comedy, and gorgeous visuals and locations, are buoyed by the mystery challenging our unflappable detective in unexpected ways and unexpected warmth and humanity amidst the darkness. We've also got some of Johnson's most skillful tonal pivots, small but impactful bits of visual flourish via light, and a movie that tackles similar ideas to the last two films without feeling preachy (ironic right?).

Arguably the best of the bunch.

Superman

I can't imagine what it's like for Marvel to watch James Gunn, the fella who took The Guardians of the Galaxy and not only made them household names, but also crafted three celebrated superhero movies at times when people thought the genre was either overexposed or dead, go next door to your biggest rival and immediately make them relevant again with a character they've been failing to get right on film for over three decades.

Probably not a great feeling for Marvel, but great news for audiences who were treated to one of the most upbeat comic book movies in recent memory.

Almost everything here is exactly what you'd come to expect from Gunn. An immaculately casted comic book movie that's got big laughs, big action and a soft gooey heartfelt core at its center.

Does it help that the movie can be summarized as "an illegal alien takes down an evil billionaire," per Sean Gunn. Of course! Does it also help that this movie seems to revel in Clark Kent's inherent dorkiness and leans into everything Zack Snyder's version was afraid of? Also yes. Does bringing in a good bad dog help? Why wouldn't it? How about Super Friends who get to show out and show off? Hells yeah! How about making this Superman arguably the most powerful and vulnerable version of the character put to screen? It doesn't hurt. How about filming in Cleveland? Ok that one might just be for me.

But the real appeal and hook of this movie, is the Big Blue Boy Scout's inherent humanity. That good heart that cuts through the skeptics and insincerity. His desire to do good things regardless of what the political implications are. Hence why you have him saving animals from a literal kaiju or being an unapologetic fan of a bad pop punk band. 

In a world where everything that seems too good to be true, this version of Superman is the real deal.

Sinners

Trying to categorize Sinners in a single genre is a fool's errand. That's also what makes it awesome. 

If you want music we've got a blues-infused score and soundtrack full of re-invented classic songs, hell Michael B. Jordan's Smoke Stack twins take their name from one, new catchy-as-hell tunes, re-imagined folk songs, and genre-hybrids that blend together Black America's past present and future.

For horror, we've got some of the most intimidating vampires ever put to screen with a terrifying turn from Jack O'Connell and all of the squelching blood and guts we've come to expect from the genre.

The action ranges from pitched battles to survival to pure catharsis.

The acting is top tier across the board.

The romance is equal parts sensual and tragic.

The jokes land.

Small scenes and details vacillate between cool-as-hell (I love our ingenous vampire hunters) to pointed (see what crossing a street really means in 1932 Mississippi).

We have a miracle of a cast with Michael B. Jordan turning in two wildly different performances as the Smoke Stack twins, Wunmi Mosaku's quietly powerful turn, Delroy Lindo shifting between jokes and pathos, Miles Caton is a revelation, Hailee Steinfeld turns in one of her best roles in years, and Jack O'Connell hits the nail of the head for "charmingly creepy-as-hell."

Ryan Coogler and company take big swing after big swing, beautifully capturing the merger of joy and pain of being black in America where almost every moment or flourish hits.

An action packed period horror musical for the ages that's so much fun, many of its technical flourishes might sneak past you...until those become undeniable as well.

Easily my favorite movie of the year and a burst of filmmaking creativity I hope we see more of in our blockbuster cinema moving forward.