The Films of 2025

[Lowry_Sam]

The Voice of Hind Rajab:
For those here who are in that world, I am also curious to know what they think of the depiction of either EMS staff or what are essentially crisis therapists in the film

I actually interviewed to be a 911 call center responder fresh out of school (I think I wasn't offered the job because I was late to the interview & being at the center when your shift starts was extremely important), but only know a bit second-hand, however I do have enough common sense to judge the behavior in the film to be really inappropriate. I did have an overall positive reaction to the film, but I was not visibly moved as were many in the audience. I wondered if part of the problem was that I had seen All That's Left Of You earlier in the day and found it completely devastating, and so I just wasn't as moved by The Voice of Hind Rajab because of its more limited focus. But the more I thought about it, the more irritated I became with the details of this one. What bothered me most was the behavior of Omar. There is no way anyone would tolerate his behavior in an emergency center, it was not just unprofessional, it is detrimental to the operation as a whole. I also found it highly unlikely that anyone would let a newbie like him on a call of that import, much less take control of things (like their personal phone) in the way that he did. In the call center I interviewed for, Omar would never have made it to the interview process.

Another problem I had with the film was that I felt that the use of the actual call & phone footage worked against the dramatization of the workers. I was struck by how different the actual responders were to their fictional representation: they were actually very calm and professional in the bits that we got to see. This made me feel the writing and acting were over playing things for the sake of dramatizing the issue in a way that actually wasn't necessary and ended up undermining the director's intent.

The other thing that was completely unrealistic was that the entire film focused on just the one call. There were no other competing emergencies (or anything for that matter) competing for their attention. It is completely unbelievable that nothing else was happening in the call center during that call and everyone could just drop what they're doing and pay exclusive attention to it (not to mention that the most histrionic of the responders would be writing the time the call was taking on the window with a magic marker, this is something for 007 movies not real call center hubs).

[Matt]

The Smashing Machine: Oh dear. This was clearly a passion project for Dwayne Johnson, years in the making. And he really does his best, mostly disappearing into the character of Mark Kerr, but also sometimes just disappearing into the heavy makeup and prosthetics. This might have been a good film, I just don't think Benny Safdie was the right collaborator for this. There's really no narrative here, just scene, scene, scene. Mark wins! Mark loses! Mark's on drugs! Mark's clean again! Mark and Dawn fight! Mark and Dawn make up! The end.

Spoiler

But no, it's not the end, because here's the real Mark Kerr talking to himself in a grocery store parking lot in 2025. Huh?

Poor Emily Blunt has nothing to do except play "dumb bitch girlfriend" who turns up and disappears, then turns up again and disappears again. We have no idea how or where she and Mark meet, why they're together, what she does, or where she came from. There's a moment where she says to Mark, "I don't think you know anything about me," and, no ma'am, none of us do. We find out more about her during the "where are they now" titles before the end credits than we do in the rest of the film.

Where there is exposition, it's extremely clumsy. The explanation of the stakes for each fight come from a single disembodied announcer, and it's unclear if he's supposed to be in the arena (it doesn't sound like it) or doing some kind of broadcast play-by-play (we never see it). We learn from Mark what MMA is because, as he is sitting in a doctor's office waiting room, he decides to explain it to an older woman who didn't even ask him anything. He's just like, "You're probably wondering about my eyes. Well, you see, I'm a mixed martial arts fighter, etc., etc."

I also hate the way it looks. The cinematographer, Maceo Bishop, also shot the Benny Safdie TV series "The Curse," and they look the same—this kind of warm but flat lighting and everything shot with the longest lenses possible with just sort of the general idea of blocking and framing. So everyone and everything is just kind of flattened out without depth, no sense of scale, and observed from a great distance. Which is exactly how the film treats its characters and subject. If you've seen the first trailer, you've seen the film. There really isn't much more there.

The faults of the movie might be down to trying to be faithful to the events of Kerr's life instead of trying to make good cinema. I haven't seen the original 2002 documentary, but there are several details in the trailer for it that are recreated in Safdie's film down to the yellow Nautica sweatshirt he wears when greeting fans in Japan and the style of headphones he wears when listening to music. Honestly, the documentary looks like it's a lot more interesting and moving.

[cantinflas]

Did you get anything out of the soundtrack? I found it mesmerising.

Thinking back on the movie, it's no masterpiece but I did find it quite touching at times, heightened by the score. Safdie does some Cassavetes aping for sure but the kind of oblique structure was effective for me at capturing the alienation of a tender fighter.

Blunt's character would pop up in these scattered scenes without much background but as a tragic figure caught up in his spiralling OCD it made sense to me, as it took her to the brink of losing her own identity and life. Thought she was pretty good in this role.

I'm realising that this all sounds like I loved it but honestly all your criticisms are valid and I don't really disagree. It could also be that I've misremembered everything and am completely wrong. I feel like I was just able to block out or accept the weaker moments including the fighting scenes which were strangely irrelevant to me.

[Matt]

I did actually like the music, a good mix of the styles of Daniel Lopatin and Jonny Greenwood while being its own thing and not quite as overbearing as those guys. Showing the composer herself playing the US national anthem in that style was a little distracting, but still somehow worked to get us inside Kerr’s head at that moment. I particularly liked the use of “Corridor of Dreams” by The Cleaners from Venus, which just kind of emerged organically from the score.

I do think Blunt was good with what she had to work with, but you can see her forcefully tamping down her intelligence to play this stereotyped role. Not to say they’re not intelligent, but this is the kind of role Julia Fox or Debi Mazar have played perfectly with much less visible effort.

What’s maybe unfortunate for the film is that it can be so easily compared with Marty Supreme: a striver, present at the birth of his sport, seeks victory at all costs, weathering setbacks and humiliation, finding more success in Japan than the US, while having a volatile, on-and-off relationship with his troubled girlfriend. For me, it comes up short in every comparison.

I’ll be interested to see what Benny Safdie comes up with on his own in a project that’s not a collaboration or a project developed by someone else and brought to him.

[cantinflas]

That's so true about Julia Fox, she would've been more fitting here. Guess the Blunt/Rock combo was in full effect though and that helped to get it made.

Loved that part of the soundtrack too. The music really is the highlight and I guess made the whole better for me than it actually was.

Marty Supreme only just opened here so I haven't got a chance to see it yet. The comparisons are inevitable and you can't help but speculate that they are directly competing with each other, otherwise I don't think Benny would've taken this. He did win in Venice though so it's already validated.

[Soy Cuba]

Agree on Hind Rijhab. It was just too one dimensional for me. Far too repetitive until the last 10 minutes which was the only time I got emtional. I think they relied on the actual phone audio packing a punch theme a little too much. It's a decent film and the message is an important one, but it didn't live up to its' billing for me.

Smashing machine is a 6.5/10. Possibly worth seeing but ultimately forgattable for someone who has no interest in the subject matter like me.

[Matt]

Afternoons of Solitude: I think I don't understand why this film exists. It's not a portrait of Andrés Roca Rey or a Wisemanesque observational documentary. It's basically two scenes repeated: Roca in the ring and Roca in the van before or after the fight being obsequiously flattered by his team. I've seen it compared to Zidane, A 21st Century Portrait, and I can see the points of comparison. The films similarly focus on a central figure in extreme isolation as he does his job. Here the crowd is never seen, only heard (and complained about), but there is no sense of progression in the film as there is in the Zidane film. With Zidane, he was filmed with multiple synchronized cameras as a single match plays out in real time. Here, we don't know where or when in time we are, and can't even situate where in the arena Roca is. Everything is much more abstracted and filmed in lengthy single takes and very closely through very long lenses or stationary GoPro-style cameras.

If the film has a statement to make, it seems to be about the extreme isolation of Roca. He is never seen relaxing or talking to family or friends or even having a conversation at all. He's only preparing for, performing in, or leaving a fight, and all (very superficial) talk is of the fight. I think I would have been more interested in a film that shows the preparation for a fight, a fight in full, and then the aftermath, but maybe that's just me wanting more conventionality from a film. There are only so many bleeding and dying bulls I can stand to see, but maybe that's another piece of what the film is saying. It very pointedly takes no stand on the moral issue of bullfighting, so we can be horrified by the brutality of it at the same time we can be admiring of Roca's dancelike skill and artistry.

The scene where he is being dressed is fascinating, and I gladly would have watched that whole sequence in real time. Him wearing his sparkling rosary as a necklace, pulling on his sheer white bodystocking followed by the pink socks is such a startlingly pretty, frankly feminine counterpoint to the preening machismo, everyone talking incessantly about how big Roca's balls are, metaphorically speaking, and the brutal bloodshed of the fighting that I think it's the high point of the film (though clearly the former doesn't work without the latter).

I'll never want to watch this again, and I'm not sure my life is better for having watched it, but I can't deny it made me feel something.

[senseabove]

Alexander Horwath's Henry Fonda for President is streaming at Le Cinema Club this week.

[hearthesilence]

Afternoons of Solitude: I think I don't understand why this film exists. It's not a portrait of Andrés Roca Rey or a Wisemanesque observational documentary. It's basically two scenes repeated: Roca in the ring and Roca in the van before or after the fight being obsequiously flattered by his team. I've seen it compared to Zidane, A 21st Century Portrait, and I can see the points of comparison. The films similarly focus on a central figure in extreme isolation as he does his job. Here the crowd is never seen, only heard (and complained about), but there is no sense of progression in the film as there is in the Zidane film. With Zidane, he was filmed with multiple synchronized cameras as a single match plays out in real time. Here, we don't know where or when in time we are, and can't even situate where in the arena Roca is. Everything is much more abstracted and filmed in lengthy single takes and very closely through very long lenses or stationary GoPro-style cameras.

If the film has a statement to make, it seems to be about the extreme isolation of Roca. He is never seen relaxing or talking to family or friends or even having a conversation at all. He's only preparing for, performing in, or leaving a fight, and all (very superficial) talk is of the fight. I think I would have been more interested in a film that shows the preparation for a fight, a fight in full, and then the aftermath, but maybe that's just me wanting more conventionality from a film. There are only so many bleeding and dying bulls I can stand to see, but maybe that's another piece of what the film is saying. It very pointedly takes no stand on the moral issue of bullfighting, so we can be horrified by the brutality of it at the same time we can be admiring of Roca's dancelike skill and artistry.

The scene where he is being dressed is fascinating, and I gladly would have watched that whole sequence in real time. Him wearing his sparkling rosary as a necklace, pulling on his sheer white bodystocking followed by the pink socks is such a startlingly pretty, frankly feminine counterpoint to the preening machismo, everyone talking incessantly about how big Roca's balls are, metaphorically speaking, and the brutal bloodshed of the fighting that I think it's the high point of the film (though clearly the former doesn't work without the latter).

I'll never want to watch this again, and I'm not sure my life is better for having watched it, but I can't deny it made me feel something.

I haven't seen it but sat through the debate over it for Film Comment's end of year podcast (it was the sole documentary to break into their critics' poll's top ten, landing at #6). FWIW, the editors who loved it said they were taken by its focus on the ritualistic pageantry and what they perceived as a lot of macho posturing, arguing that the film ultimately saw through the sport as a highly dubious endeavor deserving of ridicule.

[Matt]

I think the film invites but does not endorse that reading. I've read a few interviews with Serra (which were not actually very illuminating) and he seems to admire Roca genuinely and doesn't have much to say about bullfighting itself. Interestingly, he said that Roca was not happy with the film because it only showed him winning against weak bulls.

[diamonds]

Alexander Horwath's Henry Fonda for President is streaming at Le Cinema Club this week.

I want to highlight this for anyone who may have missed it and/or is interested in the subject, as it was one of the best films I saw last year. A superlative essay film—penetrating, multifaceted, and far-ranging—that masks what is, at its heart, a séance. And Fonda is far from the only ghost resurrected over its three hour runtime: haunted American landscapes, John Ford and the Western genre (such a vital instrument for the American cinema to interrogate the national character, now lost), the Native American victims of genocide, Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, Will Brown…

That such a tremendous work of scholarship is being offered for free is quite a generous gift.

[hearthesilence]

Alexander Horwath's Henry Fonda for President is streaming at Le Cinema Club this week.

Thanks for the heads up, this was indeed a great film. (I just updated my top ten and included it in the top half.) Joseph McBride must’ve got word too because he said he was finally going to see it and presumably post about it.

[zedz]

Afternoons of Solitude: I think I don't understand why this film exists. It's not a portrait of Andrés Roca Rey or a Wisemanesque observational documentary. It's basically two scenes repeated: Roca in the ring and Roca in the van before or after the fight being obsequiously flattered by his team. I've seen it compared to Zidane, A 21st Century Portrait, and I can see the points of comparison. The films similarly focus on a central figure in extreme isolation as he does his job. Here the crowd is never seen, only heard (and complained about), but there is no sense of progression in the film as there is in the Zidane film. With Zidane, he was filmed with multiple synchronized cameras as a single match plays out in real time. Here, we don't know where or when in time we are, and can't even situate where in the arena Roca is. Everything is much more abstracted and filmed in lengthy single takes and very closely through very long lenses or stationary GoPro-style cameras.

If the film has a statement to make, it seems to be about the extreme isolation of Roca. He is never seen relaxing or talking to family or friends or even having a conversation at all. He's only preparing for, performing in, or leaving a fight, and all (very superficial) talk is of the fight. I think I would have been more interested in a film that shows the preparation for a fight, a fight in full, and then the aftermath, but maybe that's just me wanting more conventionality from a film. There are only so many bleeding and dying bulls I can stand to see, but maybe that's another piece of what the film is saying. It very pointedly takes no stand on the moral issue of bullfighting, so we can be horrified by the brutality of it at the same time we can be admiring of Roca's dancelike skill and artistry.

The scene where he is being dressed is fascinating, and I gladly would have watched that whole sequence in real time. Him wearing his sparkling rosary as a necklace, pulling on his sheer white bodystocking followed by the pink socks is such a startlingly pretty, frankly feminine counterpoint to the preening machismo, everyone talking incessantly about how big Roca's balls are, metaphorically speaking, and the brutal bloodshed of the fighting that I think it's the high point of the film (though clearly the former doesn't work without the latter).

I'll never want to watch this again, and I'm not sure my life is better for having watched it, but I can't deny it made me feel something.

I felt that the kind of suspension you noted was one of the film's strengths, and it seemed to me that Serra's odd approach to the subject was intended to allow us to focus on more than one aspect of it. The film leaves us in no doubt that bullfighting is barbaric, and doesn't provide any space for the typical platitudes that the bullfighter and bull are noble and equal opponents, or that the 'art' of bullfighting is so sublime that it justifies the bloodshed, but what I got from the film is that this is not the only point of interest in this bizarre cultural phenomenon. And so it gives equal weight to bullfighting as an esoteric and florid manifestation of performative masculinity (which, god knows, is a timely topic if anything is), and as a hollow, repetitive job. As a viewer, I felt like I was floating around the subject able to consider it from multiple viewpoints, and the abstraction of the fight sequences served to humanize the bulls while dehumanizing Roca (all that gurning and snorting).

I also felt that the film was, without being tendentious or scolding, very squarely on the side of the bulls. The giveaway is the opening shot where we're alongside the bulls, at peace, in the dark, just breathing with them. They're portrayed as tortured victims rather than empowered opponents, and the fight isn't presented so much as a matter of skill as dices-loaded goading and attrition. I bet I wasn't the only member of the audience aching to see Roca gored.

[Matt]

I was certainly pro-bull while watching it. And it was a little satisfying to have the shot where Roca enters the van not in his ornate matador outfit but in a paper hospital gown.

[Lowry_Sam]

The Librarians documentary can now be watched via Independent Lens through PBS' own Youtube channel.

[knives]

The 2008 nostalgia is like one line of Julie Kavner voiceover, almost all of the other period dressing is reminders that they’re in a recession or Ella being a classic model of the 2000s liberal scold (but lovably so). I liked it quite a bit but it’s casually very strange in the same way as the other maligned James L. Brooks movies; most of the actual plot is sped through like an epilogue while the actual climax is Ella’s little brother trying desperately to get back with Ayo Edebiri. I dunno if anyone here besides Domino fucks with “late” period Brooks (five movies out of seven at this point) but if you can roll with those, there should be a lot to enjoy and be moved by here. Emma Mackey is a star in the making, she’s born for screwball (even a particularly odd strain of it) and I’m glad Greta Gerwig might be the next one to showcase that.

I really liked this. I don’t think it will be anyone’s favorite of the year, but the humour produces about a chuckle every few seconds and two strong laughs. It also handles its one dramatic conceit, the trauma of terrible parents, really well. It’s a total fantasy realm but in an old school Hollywood way that Brooks seems the last bastion of.

[cantinflas]

The 2008 nostalgia is like one line of Julie Kavner voiceover, almost all of the other period dressing is reminders that they’re in a recession or Ella being a classic model of the 2000s liberal scold (but lovably so). I liked it quite a bit but it’s casually very strange in the same way as the other maligned James L. Brooks movies; most of the actual plot is sped through like an epilogue while the actual climax is Ella’s little brother trying desperately to get back with Ayo Edebiri. I dunno if anyone here besides Domino fucks with “late” period Brooks (five movies out of seven at this point) but if you can roll with those, there should be a lot to enjoy and be moved by here. Emma Mackey is a star in the making, she’s born for screwball (even a particularly odd strain of it) and I’m glad Greta Gerwig might be the next one to showcase that.

I really liked this. I don’t think it will be anyone’s favorite of the year, but the humour produces about a chuckle every few seconds and two strong laughs. It also handles its one dramatic conceit, the trauma of terrible parents, really well. It’s a total fantasy realm but in an old school Hollywood way that Brooks seems the last bastion of.

Cosign all this, it was touching and offbeat and pretty unique in this day and age to see such sincerity. Ella is so genuine it hurts. Was sad that I was literally the only one in the cinema at my screening.

Emma Mackey is def great and should be a blast to see her in the upcoming Dupieux film.

[therewillbeblus]

The 2008 nostalgia is like one line of Julie Kavner voiceover, almost all of the other period dressing is reminders that they’re in a recession or Ella being a classic model of the 2000s liberal scold (but lovably so). I liked it quite a bit but it’s casually very strange in the same way as the other maligned James L. Brooks movies; most of the actual plot is sped through like an epilogue while the actual climax is Ella’s little brother trying desperately to get back with Ayo Edebiri. I dunno if anyone here besides Domino fucks with “late” period Brooks (five movies out of seven at this point) but if you can roll with those, there should be a lot to enjoy and be moved by here. Emma Mackey is a star in the making, she’s born for screwball (even a particularly odd strain of it) and I’m glad Greta Gerwig might be the next one to showcase that.

I enjoy late/'recent' Brooks and really loved Ella McCay. It's completely 'off' from the first major scene where Ella confronts her father and gives life lessons to her brother in such a bizarre frenzy unprompted without context, but it's so lovable and funny despite and because of that screwbally tone. It's the kind of film you just have to read differently, on the level of old Hollywood, much like David O. Russell's underappreciated Nailed! I too found it odd how all these major plot points are often dumped and cast aside, designating them as minor next to all the other more important details about life. It's a great strategy destined to alienate viewers, but I was here for it. There's far more focus on tweaking almost every element of this world into something just a little bit weird.

[thirtyframesasecond]

Anniversary only got a limited release when it was released in November and is now streaming on Netflix. It's a film (warning) about creeping authoritarianism, where a liberal East coast family get swept away by the changing political tide in the US, which starts relatively close to home. Despite some fairly broad characterisation, this works pretty well and doesn't hammer you over the head with lazy and blunt political messaging. It certainly puts a new twist on Magritte's 'The Lovers'.

[thirtyframesasecond]

Together, directed by first-timer Michael Shanks, stars Dave Franco and Alison Brie as a couple in relationship difficulties after their move from the city to a rural town and the death of his parents. What starts as a pretty serious drama then becomes a supernatural body-horror film about intimacy and connection. Very impressive.

[Boosmahn]

2025's undertone (previously The Undertone) received a wide release this weekend. Knowing very little going in, I liked it!

Spoiler

I knew nothing about the demonic aspect of the film. I was a little bit disappointed this turned out to be the main threat, but it was nowhere near the disappointment I felt from similar revelations in a certain other couple of horror movies released in the past two years. (Shouldn't be difficult to guess which two I'm referring to...) Maybe because I went in with more balanced expectations this time around?

Still, I was genuinely frightened by some of the Abyzou things, even if writer-director Tuason could have connected them more to the protagonist's religious upbringing. I think that connection was something that could have been explored.

As Mr Sausage has said before, the sound design is very good, though the visuals are also effective at raising tension. I was constantly scanning the darkness in the frame to see if anything was there.

Spoiler

I also liked how the film kept avoiding traditional jumpscares -- pans back and forth didn't end in something lunging at the camera, a mirror cabinet opening and closing didn't reveal a demon, those kinds of things.