Favourite New Films of 2025
Earlier this month it was announced Netflix wants to buy Warner Bros. - a company that does not care about cinemas or theatrical release, unless its seeking Oscar nominations.
Even Rian Johnson is ‘frustrated’ because Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, a Netflix film isn’t in enough cinemas.
I’m afraid of the worst case scenario if this deal goes ahead and its domino effect outside America. I’m also wondering what will be the state programming classics from WB’s catalogue.
”We live in an age where digital screens are always on. There is a constant flow of information. However, cinema is much more than just a screen; it is an intersection of desires, memories and questions.”
”Cultural facilities, such as cinemas and theaters, are the beating hearts of our communities because they contribute to making them more human. If a city is alive, it is thanks in part to its cultural spaces. We must inhabit these spaces and build relationships within them, day after day.”
”The logic of algorithms tends to repeat what “works,” but art opens up what is possible. Not everything has to be immediate or predictable.”
Here in Dubai, we now have a new “Films and Games Commission”, established last December, and a forum was held in May. Last month, it was announced that two new film and gaming committees were formed “dedicated to advancing the emirate’s film and gaming industries.” There’s a constant reset when it comes to the ‘film industry’ here, and never building on what already exists and efforts made by other people in the field. Grouping films and games just makes it sound like the aim is to make ‘content’ instead of films. I’ve been following this from afar and curious to see what kind of films will be supported and funded.
There’s only one UAE feature film from the past year worth writing, The Vile / Hoba (Majid Al Ansari), a horror film released during Halloween week. It was at several genre film festivals before and won Best Horror Feature at Fantastic Fest 2025. It’s about polygamy and how it disrupts a family, a topic that I’ve not seen handled this openly in a film. I liked it, and will try to write about it another time.
I’ve been doing my usual cinema outings here, and keeping up to date with new releases by checking all the listings on the cinema’s websites - the only reliable way to not miss anything. Some films get listed last minute, some months in advance. Some disappear a few days after getting released. We’re still getting censored versions of films rated 18+, Noseferatu and The Last Showgirl had their endings chopped up. Why bother releasing them?
Besides catching up on new releases during my travels, I also attended IFFR, Venice Film Fest, Viennale to catch up on the new titles. Lots of films from the big festivals this year didn’t live up to the hype, and I found myself responding more to non-festival films, general releases mostly watched in a multiplex.
The following list consists of my top 30 of 2025, starting with a ranked top 10 favourites, and the rest is in alphabetical order. I wrote a few words for some of them.
Note:
Films I really wanted to watch this year but didn’t get a chance:
Blue Heron (Sophy Romvari), The Christophers (Steven Soderbergh), If I Had Legs I’d Kick You (Mary Bronstein), Marty Supreme (Josh Safdie)
1. Silent Friend (Ildikó Enyedi)
Biennale Cinema 2025 - The 82nd Venice International Film
A film about connecting and communicating, science and curiosity, and the mysteries of nature. Told in a three non-linear timelines - 1908, 1972, 2020 with a gingko tree in a university botanical garden as the common thread in all 3. At a time when there’s so much being done to divide people, and political agendas undermining and effecting the health, education and culture sectors, it was the uplifting film I needed to see. I left thinking about how the natural world still holds so much wonder and mystery.
I watched it at the Venice Film Festival in September where it premiered, and since then it has been at a few more festivals. I hope more people will see it in 2026.
2. One Battle After Another (Paul Thomas Anderson)
Bioskop Sutjeska, Cacak Serbia
Cinemaxx Galerija (IMAX), Belgrade
VOX Cinemas - Festival City (IMAX), Dubai
BFI IMAX 70mm, London
“Life man, LIFE!”
“Ocean waves, ocean waves.”
This film is an absolute treat, darkly funny, and completely rewatchable. I’m so happy I got to see it four times, each time it got more and more rewarding. The only format that I’ve not been able to see it in is VistaVision 35 / 70mm.
One film still isn’t enough, also because Benecio Del Torro is an absolute darling in this.
3. Kontinental ‘25 (Radu Jude)
Viennale 2025
A scathing film about the housing crisis, homelessness, greedy property developers and social status, and the morals of today’s society at large. A bailiff responsible for evicting a man and the guilt she feels finding him commit suicide, and seeking validation from colleagues, friends, and even the local priest for doing her job. The dialogue (based on the English subtitles) is sharp, funny and brutal. The film won the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay at Berlinale in February.
4. Sinners (Ryan Coogler)
BFI IMAX 70mm, London (watched it twice there)
“You keep dancing with the devil... one day he's gonna follow you home.”
5. Nuestra Tierra (Lucrecia Martel)
Biennale Cinema 2025 - The 82nd Venice International Film
“We were taught what the books said. That this country has been inhabited by Indigenous peoples. Very little was said about the fact that Indigenous peoples still inhabit it.”
6. The Secret Agent (Kleber Mendonça Filho)
Viennale 2025
“I saw some things I'll never forget, that I'll carry with me to my grave. I also did three things that I won't talk about, but I did them.”
7. The Mastermind (Kelly Reichardt)
Viennale 2025
“I think it is generally true, though, that there is tremendous feelings of powerlessness, cynicism, apathy on the part of large numbers of people.”
A day after watching this, news broke of the robbery at the Louvre Museum.
8. Black Bag (Steven Soderbergh)
Vue Leicester Square
“When you can lie about everything, when you can deny everything, how do you tell the truth about anything?”
9. Homebound (Neeraj Ghaywan)
VOX Cinemas - Grand Hyatt, Dubai
“Tell the truth, and you’re alienated from the world. Tell a lie, and you're alienated from yourself.”
About friendship, the caste system and social status for Muslim and Dalit communities in India. Vishal Jethwa as Chandan who is a Dalit, and Ishaan Khatter as Shoaib who is a Muslim are best friends with ambitions of joining the police to improve their social and financial status. But the bureaucracy of job applications and the bigotry it entails forces them to look for poorly paid jobs.
Life choices test their friendship, and the discrimination becomes more and more difficult to avoid, with tragic consequences. I couldn’t control my tears during the end credits.
I watched this in the afternoon and there was only one other person in the theatre. He approached me after the film ended to talk about it, which I really appreciated. A rare encounter for me in a cinema in Dubai.
10. Better Man (Michael Gracey)
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
Pathe Tuschinski, Amsterdam
Emirates In-flight
“I want to make that same twelve-year-old feel safe on stage. I'm a fucking entertainer. It might be cabaret, but it's world class cabaret, and I'm the fucking best at it.
Fuck yourselves.”
I first watched this film on Dec 30 last year and liked it a lot. But I watched it three more times this year and decided it has to be added to this list. And if you’re a regular reader of this blog, you would’ve noticed the amount of posts I wrote about Robbie Williams this year.
11. 28 Years Later (Danny Boyle)
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
“There are many kinds of death. Some are better than others. The best are peaceful where we leave each other in love.”
“Every skull is a set of thoughts. These sockets saw and these jaws spoke and swallowed. This is a monument to them. A temple.”
I took me a while to like this film more after first watching it. I was moved most by the scenes with Ralph Fiennes as Dr Kelson and how he talked about death. But the film somehow stayed with me, and over time has won me over. I’m now very much looking forward to 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.
12. Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy (Michael Morris)
VOX Cinemas - Festival City, Dubai
“And even though there might be 600,000 words in the human language, the world still struggles to find the right ones when someone you love is gone.”
Did not expect it to be about coping with grief, parenting, getting older and a reliable community of long-term friends who've always been there.
13. The Currents (Milagros Mumenthaler)
Viennale 2025
“It’s like you never came back.”
No easy answers in this film about a woman feeling dissociated from herself. Isabel Aimé González Sola as Lina is terrific.
14. Den of Thieves 2: Pantera (Christian Gudegast)
Reel Cinemas - Dubai Mall
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
“I fucking hate suits. Nothing good ever happens in a suit.”
I was hoping this would be set in London, picking up from the ending of the first film because I wanted to hear more of O'Shea Jackson Jr.‘s bad British accent. Instead, it was set in Mediterranean Europe, and we got another accent from him, French.
This sequel looks slicker, with less shooting and Gerard Butler saying things like “capitaain”, “croissante”, and “fuck NATO”. Can’t wait for part 3.
15. Do You Love Me (Lana Daher)
Giornate degli Autori - The 82nd Venice International Film
A wonderful assembly of archives spanning 70 years about Lebanon’s audiovisual collective memory, it includes footage, images and sounds from Lebanese films, home videos, family albums photographs, and music.
The editing by Qutaiba Barhamji really pulls it together making it an engaging film about history, memory and resistance, without any scenes of violence and destruction that we normally see about Lebanon or neighbouring countries.
The audience clapping along to the song We Come Now to Beirut, sung by Melhem Barakat from a TV variety show was both lovely and moving, and a testament the film speaks to not just a Lebanese / Arab audience.
16. The Flowers Stand Silently Witnessing (Theo Panagopoulos)
Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai
17. The Love That Remains (Hlynur Pálmason)
Viennale 2025
A year in a life of a family, three children and their estranged parents - an artist mother, a fisherman father. A passage of time with its good days and bad - change of seasons, a father feeling more and more excluded, a mother developing her artistic practice, beautiful Icelandic landscapes as a playground for the children, children and adults trying to figure things out. Tender, funny, melancholic.
18. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
VOX Cinemas - Festival City (IMAX), Dubai (watched it twice there)
“…digital information has been corrupted worldwide; nations and people no longer know what to believe. Antagonism, aggression, and martial law are the new world order.”
19. The Naked Gun (Akiva Schaffer)
VOX Cinemas - Festival City, Dubai
“I remember when the only things that were electric were eels, chairs, and Catherine Zeta-Jones in Chicago."
20. No Other Choice (Park Chan-wook)
Biennale Cinema 2025 - The 82nd Venice International Film
“I’m afraid we have no other choice; we have to let you go.”
Excellent set design and cinematography - a couple of shots made me ask myself how did they shoot that. Want to rewatch it just for those reasons.
21. Presence (Steven Soderbergh)
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
A dysfunctional family, a haunted house, a Soderbergh horror from the point of view of an unknown spirit. I loved the camera work and the air of suspense. Needed more Julia Fox.
22. Relay (David Mackenzie)
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
“I thought I'd get to see what evil really looked like… but you just look like everyone else.”
Riz Ahmed is very good in this.
23. Roofman (Derek Cianfrance)
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
“There are over 10,000 almost identical McDonald’s across the United States. Question was: How many do you need to rob to get a real house, buy your kids nice things and win your family back? Turns out, the answer is 45.”
Channing Tatum and Kirsten Dunst are so good in this, but apparently their names alone weren’t enough to get more people to watch it.
24. A Sad and Beautiful World (Cyril Aris)
Giornate degli Autori - The 82nd Venice International Film
“Is this the world you want to bring children into?”
A second film from Lebanon on this list. A love story in times of political, economical and social turmoil. She wants to leave, he wants to stay. About compromise, hope, pain and faint faith that things will get better.
25. Sharp Corner (Jason Buxton)
VOX Cinemas - Festival City, Dubai
“You want those accidents to happen.”
About male insecurity, whether it is pre-existing or caused by a recent move to the suburbs or not getting the sought after job promotion, or feeling adequate at family life. He gets preoccupied with a new troubling obsession to save lives caused by fatal car accidents that regularly happen outside his home because of a sharp corner that often gets overlooked. Dark and eerie, with a great performance by Ben Foster.
26. She Rides Shotgun (Nick Rowland)
VOX Cinemas - Festival City, Dubai
The final scene crushed me.
27. Sirāt (Óliver Laxe)
Burg Kino, Vienna
This film could easily belong in my top 20, but I am still trying to grapple with parts of this film - particularly the disconnect between the western foreign ravers and the locals. But out of his previous films I’ve seen, this is my favourite and I love some of the desert scenes, especially at night and the cross fades. Good music too.
Possible spoiler:
I don’t think I can watch it again because of one particular scene with a child that made me cover my face and say no when it happened. I just couldn’t shake off how upset I felt it was for the rest of the film.
28. Splitsville (Michael Angelo Covino)
Bioskop Sutjeska, Cacak, Serbia
The better film starring Dakota Johnson this year. And hilarious.
29. Two Seasons, Two Strangers (Sho Miyake)
Viennale 2025
“How about a story that makes people happy?”
30. Weapons (Zach Cregger)
VOX Cinemas - Festival City (IMAX), Dubai
VOX Cinemas - Wafi, Dubai
“Fucking help me!”
Honourable mention because it was also my favourite theatre experience:
Pillion (Harry Lighton)
BFI, London
“I have an aptitude for devotion.”
Sharing what I wrote on Letterboxd the night I watched it:
This is a perfect Friday night film. Also, wasn't expecting it to be a Christmas film.
Watched in an almost full NFT1 at BFI. Felt a lovely energy in the room, a crowd that laughed, cheered, gasped at the right moments.
Special shout out to
- the lady who gasped out loud "Oh my god" when Alexander Skarsgård took of his leather jacket in the Christmas night hook up behind Primark scene (I think everyone in the room felt the same, one of the hottest bodies in films this year)
- the lady with the loudest laugh in the room, it was so infectious, made everyone laugh even more
- the man who shouted a loud thank you at the end of the film and said (if I heard/understood correctly) something to the effect of thank you for being a good audiencePossible spoiler:
During the 'off day' scene, I told myself I hope they go to the cinema. Almost clapped when it happened.
Other ‘festival’ films I liked that fall just outside my top 30:
After the Hunt (Luca Guadagnino) - except for the epilogue
At Work (Valérie Donzelli)
Blue Moon (Richard Linklater)
Dry Leaf (Alexandre Koberidze)
Cotton Queen (Suzannah Mirghani)
Eddington (Ari Aster) - only had a chance to see this on Emirates In-flight
La Grazia (Paolo Sorrentino)
A House of Dynamite (Kathryn Bigelow)
It Was Just An Accident (Jafar Panahi)
Jay Kelly (Noah Baumbach)
John Lilly and the Earth Coincidence Control Office (Michael Almereyda, Courtney Stephens)
Miroirs No. 3 (Christian Petzold)
Remake (Ross McElwee)
Short Summer (Nastia Korkia)
Sorry, Baby (Eva Victor)
Long live cinema, forever and ever.