Mike’s Top Ten of 2025
2025 feels like a year of isolation. I feel like everything that came out happened in its own little bubble and there’s no overarching trend for the year. Movies came out, some made money, some were noteworthy. This year, more than any other year from the past decade, I found a significant decrease in quality of the mainstream American studio output (that is to say, large scale studio releases). Which has been a growing trend in recent years.
I remember 10, 15 years ago, the summer had something coming out every weekend. And even if it was a weekend where you weren’t interested in the ‘big’ movie that weekend, there was a counter-programmed movie that weekend that was worth seeing. It’s to the point where people once again showed how starved they are for big budget, original filmmaking by making Sinners one of the extremely few films not based on any existing IP to be a top-ten grossing film for its year.
Outside of that, however, it feels like the majority of the great films from this year (outside of the usual films from established directors who routinely make great films) came from other countries or independent productions (or films that got no releases at all, which now means it’ll take years for anyone to even realize they exist, let alone grow a following). Which is great in one sense, but also feels like it’s part of the ‘content’-ification of movies and the slow decline of the theatrical experience, especially with a major historical studio about to be bought out by another.
It’ll be interesting to look back on this time and see what it means for the history of motion pictures. (more…)
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