Oscars 2025: The Best Picture Nominees, Ranked
Some evenings, when I’m finally bored of staring calmly at my phone while the fabric of society collapses before me, I enjoy watching a good movie.
And boy, were there … not very many of those this year. Maybe I’m getting old and grumpy (I am currently staring down the barrel of The Big 3–0, Grim Reaper just itching to pull the trigger), but I think 2025’s Best Picture list is less than stellar. Yet it’s also probably the most interesting collection of nominees I’ve written about, and there’s something to be said for that.
So, opinions:
10. The Substance
Much like an Indian restaurant in a Surrey market town, I’m wary of starting things off with something too spicy, lest my audience run for the hills. But we’re doing it anyway: I didn’t think The Substance was very good.
There’s a Greta Gerwig quote about Barbie which stuck in my mind: “You can do the thing and subvert it at the same time.” It seemed pretty insightful at the time, and Barbie was a zeitgeist-stealing smash hit, so Greta must know what she’s talking about. But the more films I watch with that in mind, the more I’m not so sure. The Wolf of Wall Street was a well-made, well-acted film, yet it revelled in two hours of debauchery before Jordan Belfort got his comeuppance. In inspiring a generation of blue-balled young men to become Goldman Sachs employees, it failed in its central message. At the end of the day, you have to decide whether you’re doing the thing or subverting the thing.
The Substance is a satire about unattainable beauty standards and their catastrophic impacts. What would a chauvinist creep think of this film? They’d probably love it — especially the endless, and I really do mean endless, creepy shots of Margaret Qualley in spandex. What would a woman with severe body dysmorphia think of this film? Well, I don’t want to put opinions in other people’s mouths, but you could understand that she might feel uncomfortable that the film just screams the toxic viewpoints of society back at the viewer, then escalates things into a finale where things get so ridiculous that it undermines pretty much anything the film has been hinting at earlier on. You’re not subverting anything by getting stock characters to repeat stock phrases — “Pretty girls should always smile!” — which have been dissected a hundred times before. You’re not subverting anything by transforming Demi Moore into a gigantic fleshy Rat-King monstrosity and having her spurt blood over a crowd of screaming people. Shocking and memorable as it is, this has all the subversive energy of a 12-year-old boy shouting racial slurs down his XBOX mic.
There are good bits — Demi Moore is given the time and space to show what an accomplished actor she is, and the guy below really understands the assignment, but it’s just not enough.
The Substance fans are quick to point out that having characters shout out the themes of the film is the point: it’s punk. And it is — it is undoubtedly a punk movie, an anguished scream of rage at a society that just doesn’t care. But that doesn’t mean it helps to change anything. And that doesn’t make it good.
9. A Complete Unknown
I’ll admit that I’m not a fan of music biopics, so you might not want to take my word for this one. But a good two-thirds of this film is simple concert reenactment, and the remaining third, about the evolution of folk music away from its roots, just isn’t very interesting. And that’s coming from a man who spent his teenage years headbanging his way through the early Mumford and Sons albums, so it’s not like I’m not interested in the genre.
Bob Dylan is already fully formed at the start of this film, with half of his best songs written, and his only reaction to fame is to become an even bigger prick than he was at the start. It’s nice to see a biopic which doesn’t shy away from its character’s flaws, but it’s hard to empathise with such a one-dimensional character, especially when that one dimension is douche. It’s also just not very well-written — one climactic emotional scene ends with Dakota Fanning saying, through tears, “I’m not a plate, Bob.”
It’s a shame, really, because Timotee has clearly put years of time and effort into the role, only for it to be surrounded by a lacklustre script, and only for him to be instantly outclassed by the spectacularly good Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez — her cover of House of the Rising Sun is the highlight of the film. It must have been a humbling experience for Timotee, which may explain why he’s embraced the dark side and now spends his time drinking Pepsi with Kylie Jenner.
8. Wicked
My sole knowledge of Wicked is the fact that we had a secondary school teacher who borderline-bullied my little brother every time he was late because I didn’t get ready quick enough in the morning (sorry Ryan), and that teacher had about 15 Wicked posters in her classroom. With that in mind, I wasn’t exactly predisposed to like this one, and it’s hard to find anything great to say about it.
Everyone involved gives good performances, especially given that most scenes take place amid a computer-generated hellscape. Cynthia Erivo (interesting fact: her full name is so long it takes up an entire line on Wikipedia) is instantly likeable as Alphabet or Elephant or something. But it’s Ariana Grande who steals the show, transforming a character who should be unlikeable into something much more warm and charming. At the end of the day, though, musicals just aren’t particularly my cup of tea — I’m more about gurning to Fredagainagainagain with all my shy-Tory mates.
7. Dune: Part Two
I’m struggling with the Dune franchise. On the one hand, being introduced to this unique world through such constantly striking visuals is a joy. On the other hand — what is making me care about any of this?
Dune just isn’t interested enough in character. Here, Denis Villeneuve does what he always does: meticulously crafts a beautiful, fully-realised, fascinating world in which his characters do not talk. Recently, Denis the Menis just came out and said “Frankly, I hate dialogue.” Well, Denis, in that case, I hate you. Because the result is scenes like the gladiator battle on Harkonnen, which look spectacular but don’t get me emotionally invested.
Then there’s the problems with the original material. The plot that we get is fed to us with a Calpol spoon — “the locals believe you’re a god, but are you really tho?” The political machinations are interesting enough, but they don’t have the complexity of The Wire or House of Cards or early Game of Thrones, so that side of things isn’t particularly absorbing. And then there’s the original sin of Dune: Paul Atreides is effortlessly successful at everything he does. From riding sand worms to becoming Florence Pugh’s husband, he succeeds straightaway with no struggle whatsoever, so there are never any stakes.
6. Emilia Perez
Holy shit.
Have you ever thought that there are parallels between a former mass murderer atoning for his past sins, and the trans experience? No? Well, that puts you in the same boat as everybody except director Jacques Audiard, who decided to write a film in which suggests transitioning functions as a moral clean slate, which portrays Mexico as 100% drugs and violence, and which features a real-life racist in the starring role. Emilia Perez is a multipack can of worms.
Let’s be clear: the message of this film is wrong. The dead bodies Emilia is responsible for in her past life are packaged into her own story of self-actualisation, and that is wrong. The things is, given that the plot sounds like they carved out a chunk of asylum wall and decided to film whatever was scribbled on it, Emilia Perez should be a thousand times worse than it is. Karla Sofía Gascón, as horrible as she seems to be in real life, puts in a performance which somehow manages to ground this whole madcap enterprise in reality. When she explains why she wants to transition, you really believe her. When she loses her children, you really feel it. There is no chance of her winning the Oscar now, but it’s probably the single most impressive performance I watched this year.
In terms of the music — for sure, there are songs here which are excruciating. One song in particular qualifies under the UN’s definition of a war crime. But there is a real attempt to do something a bit different with the tropes of a musical, and even as some of the songs grate on your ears, everything mostly looks pretty good — tell me the picture above isn’t good cinema. Or look at the video below — is this not kinda interesting? Is there not an angry, vivid message here about the real world which is completely absent in almost all musicals?
Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe films like this are bad for the trans community, and maybe I’ll look back on this and cringe. But I don’t think anyone is watching this and changing their mind about trans people. And there’s something very heartwarming that a film this left-field was actually made. Should we be making films which push boundaries, which are transgressive, which take current themes and shine a completely different light on them? Fuck yeah! Points need to be given for the balls-to-the-wall audacity of it all. Emilia Perez sits at a fascinating juncture in the culture wars, pleasing absolutely no-one, and I think it’s valuable for that alone. But it probably shouldn’t have been nominated for Best Picture.
5. Conclave
I had a blast with Conclave, a good old-fashioned thriller which really deserves its nomination. All the acting is impeccable, the pacing is perfect, and there are a few visuals, like the explosion scene above, which take your breath away. It helps that everything is filmed with the backdrop of The Vatican, where centuries of harvesting the income of the poor and desperate has funded some really beautiful architecture.
The story itself feels surprisingly current, given that it focuses on an institution which is dragging its heels as it’s pulled out of the twelfth century. The Catholic Church is under pressure from changing social attitudes to gender and race and fucking young members of your congregation when you’re supposed to be a celibate cardinal, and those pressures are well-dramatised here. But most interesting is the underlying sense that the entire institution is slowly coming apart at the seams, even as the plot is resolved. You might have guessed that I wouldn’t exactly be averse to that. Did you know that if The Vatican sold all its assets, it would raise enough money to end world hunger? Just saying…
4. Nickel Boys
This is such a frustrating one. It feels like Nickel Boys was so close to being a masterpiece, but the end result was less than the sum of its parts.
The acting is understated but brilliant. Everything looks stunning. In terms of creating an atmosphere, it’s unrivalled in this list. As the fan is turned on in the room in which students are tortured, there’s a tangible sense of dread. This film’s attitude to violence is welcome — like The Zone of Interest last year, it understands that violence has just as much power, sometimes more, when it’s off the screen. It understands that showing violence can easily become misery porn, or even worse, re-iterate the message of that violence back to the audience, or even worse, make a film enjoyable for exactly the kind of person you’re trying to critique (are you listening, The Substance?).
I hate to say this, but I think Nickel Boys would have succeeded more if it was just a bit more conventional. The director does amazing things with the first-person perspective, but I need to see a character to fully empathise with them, and we don’t see enough of Elwood. Scenes which are intercut with images of the Space Race would have been more impactful if they’d been played straight, even though you can see what they were trying to do. And because the film is preoccupied with being a great work of art, the full picture of what actually happened — because all this is based on a true story —fades into the background a bit. More than one hundred kids were murdered over the century of this school’s existence, and I’m not sure that’s the type of story which should be covered up by an arty facade.
3. I’m Still Here
A brilliant antidote to Hollywood self-obsession, I’m Still Here transports you into a large Brazilian family torn apart and held together as the country slides into military dictatorship.
Unlike any of the other films on this list, I completely forgot I was watching a movie from start to finish. It’s the realism which holds the story together — while Nickel Boys distracts the viewer with space images and jazz riffs and weird camera angles, I’m Still Here has all the characters talking at once in a room with books stacked to the ceiling. Without effort, you feel you are watching a living, breathing family, and you understand who they are. It’s an impressive feat given the amount of characters and their similarities, but each character is given the right amount of screen time so you understand their place in the story.
And this is a story about feminine strength and resilience which approaches its themes with a lot more nuance than a lot of recent cinema. It celebrates Eunice and her daughters, but it strays far away from girlboss territory, it allows them to be vulnerable, it anchors them in the reality of what women in 1970s Brazil could actually do. Eunice cries in the shower, Eunice is left out by male friends who rebel against the state, Eunice becomes a leading human rights lawyer, Eunice gets dementia and loses her brilliant mind. Real life is not distorted to fit a narrative, and at no point does the film tell you what to think. I’m happy that Hollywood is paying this one some attention.
2. Anora
Anora was the Oscar film I was most looking forward to, and ultimately, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I was hoping to. But that’s my fault, not Anora’s — because I was hoping to see an unlikely romance, and Anora is so much more complicated than that. The rug-pull which comes around the hour mark is jarring for first-time viewers, but that’s the whole point: it’s hard not to fall for people, it’s hard not to fall into the pre-written stories we tell ourselves, and it’s bloody hard to admit that we were wrong.
The unhinged genius of this film is that just at the point that the full uncaring tragedy begins to reveal itself, Anora turns into a comedy. What?! An outright, slapstick, laugh-out-loud comedy, complete with car chases and kicks to the face. And then, just as you’ve adjusted yourself, another story emerges, one hidden in the background, one which offers a hint of salvation in what would otherwise be a thoroughly cynical and miserable film. The final scene of Anora is one of the most memorable things I have ever watched, and I still don’t know how I feel about it.
This complexity is hard for a Film-Bro-lite such as me to deal with. I just want to shout Lord of the Rings trivia at women in the club — why are you forcing me to think? But it’s worth realising that the real lives of working-class people defy simple categorisation; it’s worth considering that the intersections between social classes are much more complex than the good-versus-evil narrative of something like The White Lotus.
First with Tangerine, then The Florida Project, then Red Rocket, and now Anora, director Sean Baker might look like he belongs in Jackass, but he’s pulling off a trick which I haven’t seen any other director manage: (1) make movies about the working class, (2) allow working-class characters to be imperfect and maybe even bad, and (3) receive widespread acclaim. This trifecta feels especially important in our current political climate of outright broligarchy and working-class demonisation, and I’m so glad that he’s pulled it off.
- The Brutalist
The reason I do this every year is to force myself to watch things that I wouldn’t normally go to see. A four-hour movie about ugly architecture is definitely one of those things, and yet this film is some good shit.
Firstly, it looks incredible. That opening shot, winding through dark passageways until the Statue of Liberty bursts upside-down onto the screen, conveys enough patriotism to make me forget at least three US-backed coups against democratically-elected leaders. The shot of the road as the opening credits roll past, the above shot of Adrien Brody’s triangular eyebrows staring at the sparks, the shot of the bookshelves opening in the redesigned library — unforgettable. Another scene takes place as our man László is inducted into aristocratic society — while the conversation continues, there are slim cutaway shots to a woman’s dress, the corner of a doorframe — this is a film deeply aware of the beauty of things. All this is accompanied by a brilliant soundtrack, somehow both melodic and disturbing, which has taken up permanent residence inside my skull.
The story is vivid enough to hold you for the full length, although I did find it hammered home things a bit too literally — one scene of sexual violence did not need to happen. Like Anora, this film highlights the complex relationship between classes. Immigrants are used and abused by the societies they emigrate to, and yet those same societies offer geniune potential for transformative change. I also like how this film didn’t shy away from the trauma of the Holocaust, physical and emotional, while accepting that life moves on regardless.
It really is a film that contains multitudes. Yes, it’s too long, but the intermission really helps. And in our intermission, strangers in the screen actually sat and talked about the film for ten minutes — how wonderful is that?
