Best Pictures #126: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Sentimental Value

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #126: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Sentimental Value

"But what the house disliked more than noise was silence."

Sentimental Value has all of the ingredients and even the perfect title for an overwrought family melodrama. It certainly is a family drama. The premise is tailor made to incite conflict: Two daughters reconnect with their estranged filmmaker father when he wants one them, an actress, to star in his comeback project, which is about the suicide of his mother and he wants to film it in their family home. This could have been a soap opera, and probably a very interesting one, but in the hands of Norwegian director Joaquim Trier and his longtime co-writer Eskil Vogt (the team behind the acclaimed and very entertaining The Worst Person in the World, and Reprise, one of my favorite movies of the aughts) Sentimental Value is a substantial work.

The estranged filmmaker father is Gustav, played by the incredible Stellan Skarsgård, who is out of touch with his adult daughters, Nora (Renata Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas), on just about every level. He thinks that the role in his new movie could be Nora’s breakthrough, never mind that she is already a successful theater actress. His conversations with Agnes, who acted in his films as a child, are more cordial but she holds her own resentments in her own ways. A line is crossed when he wants Agnes’s young son to be in the new movie. He’s also out of touch with the new landscape of moviemaking. When asked if his new movie, a Netflix production, will play in theaters, he responds, “Where else?” 

At a film festival he’s approached by Rachel (Elle Fanning), an American movie star who is looking to challenge herself as an actress. Fanning, in one of her best performances, is great at playing an actress who is good, and earnestly wants to be better, but is not right for the role. 

If this movie feels unfocused or episodic that's only because no person's life is only about one thing. Trier and Vogt's Oscar nominated original screenplay aims to capture that. Certain sequences feel like they could be self-contained short films. My favorite of these is Gustav and Rachel on the beach at a film festival. An early scene of Nora having breakdown moments before she has to go on stage is another great self contained sequence. 

Sentimental Value is not afraid of being upfront with its themes and symbolism. A prologue tells us about Nora's 6th grade essay that imagined what the old family house saw and felt. A narrator tells us about a crack running through the house, splitting it. In a surreal moment, reminiscent of Ingmar Bergman's Persona, the faces of Gustav, Nora, and Agnes all blur together. More than one scene of Nora expressing anguish or sadness turns out to be her acting. 

When the confrontations come, they are not big or loud. There are great performances from the whole cast but no one showboats. It’s no surprise that all of the principal performers have received Oscar nominations: Renate Reinsve for Actress; Elle Fanning and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas for Supporting Actress; Stellan Skarsgård for Supporting Actor, somehow the first Oscar nomination of his impressive and eclectic career. No matter the combination of characters in a scene, their interactions are unmannered enough to feel realistic and that's what makes them so interesting to watch. These characters are allowed layers and complexities and contradictions. 

This certainly has all the markings of an Oscar bait movie. It received a total 9 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best International Picture, so I suppose it is. Yet, this is not necessarily a bad thing. Sentimental Value is also the kind of movie that Hollywood used to make on a semiregular basis and rarely makes now. I don’t care if it comes from Norway or has subtitles; I’m just glad movies like this are still being made somewhere and that people, the Academy included, are taking notice. 

Sentimental Value is available to rent on Amazon Prime Video.

Nominees: Maria Ekerhovd, Andrea Berentsen Ottmar, producers

Director: Joachim Trier

Screenplay: Eskil Vogt & Joachim Trier

Cast: Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, Elle Fanning

Production Companies: Mer Film, Eye Eye Pictures, MK Productions, et al. 

Distributor: Neon, Mubi

Release Date: December 26th, 2025

Total Nominations: 9, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: International Feature Film; Actress-Renate Reinsve; Director-Joachim Trier; Supporting Actor-Stellan Skarsgård; Supporting Actress-Elle Fanning; Supporting Actress-Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas; Original Screenplay-Joachim Trier, Eskil Vogt; Editing-Olivier Bugge Coutté 

Best Pictures #125: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Train Dreams

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #125: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Train Dreams

“The world needs a hermit in the woods as much as a preacher in the pulpit.”

I suppose you could describe Train Dreams as an arthouse film, though that is a loaded term; even my guard goes up when I hear about an arthouse movie. Train Dreams is not conventional; it is not mainstream. There are none of the typical beats that fill an average American movie. Such moments and tropes would ruin a gentle and sensitive movie like this. Sometimes a critic will call a movie they love a gem. Well, this movie is a gem; something to be treasured and appreciated and shared. Each time you look at it from just a slightly different perspective, it reveals something new and wonderful and enchanting. 

The plot, to the extent that there is a plot, is extremely simple. Joel Edgerton plays Robert Grainier, a logger living in the Pacific Northwest during the early decades of the 20th century. That's it. He is a quiet and shy person but on a rare trip to church he meets Gladys (Felicity Jones). Actually she introduces herself to him. Robert does not seem like the type to do such a thing himself. They are a wonderful match and have a daughter, but Robert spends much of his time away on logging jobs. He and Gladys plan to save money to turn their land into a farm, but things do not go as planned.

Joel Edgerton is great as the lowkey Robert. His face shows us that he is a simple man who still has deep thoughts and emotions going on beneath the surface. Robert knows that there is more meaning to life and existence and nature. He also knows that he doesn't know how to make sense of the larger meaning behind everything or how to even start contemplating it. 

Robert is haunted by his inadvertent participation in the murder of a Chinese railroad worker; he asks what the man did and is never given an answer. He asks a fellow logger, the aged Arn Peoples (William H. Macy), whose folksy wisdom likely comes from a lifetime of experiences he probably would rather not have had, if a person can be followed by the bad things he does in his life. Arn says that he's seen bad people be lifted up and good people be brought down but if he had the answer he would be sleeping next to someone better looking than Robert.

William H. Macy is a nice, lively addition as the folksy would-be philosopher Arn. His thoughts, which he is very ready to share, are not esoteric or cryptic. Only when asked about his family does he obfuscate and become cagey; that tells us all we need to know. Gladys risks becoming more of a symbol than a character but Felicity Jones gives her warmth and substance, even with relatively little screen time.

Any screenwriting or film professor will tell you not to use narration, that it is a crutch and you must show, not tell. Of course, there are many examples of good narration that adds to a movie without condescending to the audience or taking away from the performances. This is one such example. The narration here is wonderfully spoken by Will Patton, a character actor so prolific that, yes, you have absolutely seen him before. He also read the audiobook of the novella by Denis Johnson so perhaps him being the narrator is no big surprise, yet it in no way diminishes the great effect of his superb skill at bringing words to life (Patton has also read several other audiobooks and his narration makes them worth listening to). The narration along with the masterful Oscar nominated cinematography by Adolpho Veloso and the ethereal but not out of place score by Bryce Dessner give Train Dreams its poetic qualities. 

The influence of the films of Terrence Malick (Badlands and especially Days of Heaven) can be seen and felt in Train Dreams. However, and this may be heresy to some, I feel that director and co-writer Clint Bentley surpasses Malick (at least the recent films) in that Train Dreams is more than a philosophical exploration of existence and meaning. This film ponders these things too of course, but it hits on a subtle but no less affecting emotional and almost spiritual level. Train Dreams might seem like a slight movie since it is about the life of a rather ordinary, obscure man but that does not mean that his life or the film are not something special. Train Dreams is one of the best movies I have seen in quite some time. I can’t wait to see it again. 

Train Dreams is available to stream on Netflix.

Nominees: Marissa McMahon, Teddy Schwarzman, Will Janowitz, Ashley Schlaifer, Michael Heimler, producers

Director: Clint Bentley

Screenplay: Clint Bentley & Greg Kwedar; based on the novel by Denis Johnson

Cast: Joel Edgerton, Felicity Jones, Kerry Condon, William H. Macy

Production Companies: Black Bear, Kamala Films

Distributor: Netflix

Release Date: November 7th, 2025

Total Nominations: 4, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Adapted Screenplay-Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar; Cinematography-Adolpho Veloso; Original Song-"Train Dreams", Music by Nick Cave and Bryce Dessner, Lyric by Nick Cave

Best Pictures #124: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Sinners

by A.J.

Best Pictures #124: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Sinners

"A sinner like me, I can't ask for more than that."

I used to say that a genuinely good horror movie only comes along every 5 years or so. Thankfully, the last few years have proven me wrong. 2025 was a good year for horror movies, but the clear stand out was writer-director Ryan Coogler's Sinners. It was a box office and critical hit, a rare combination for a horror movie. It is also rare for the Academy Awards to recognize a movie released in the first half of the year. It is even rarer for the Academy to recognize horror movies. So, it is very remarkable and exciting that Sinners not only received Oscar nominations, but received 16 nominations including Best Picture, the most of any film in Academy history. This is fitting because Sinners is a most remarkable and special film. 

In his 5th collaboration with Ryan Coogler (after Creed and the Black Panther movies to name a few), Michael B. Jordan plays gangster twins Smoke and Stack in 1932 Mississippi. After 7 years in Chicago they return to their hometown loaded with cash, Irish beer, Italian wine, and a secret trunk to set up a juke joint, have a good time, and watch the money flow in. They reconnect with friends and lovers, not all of whom are excited to see Smoke and Stack return. They also take in their teenage cousin, Sammie (Miles Caton), nicknamed Preacherboy, who is supremely gifted at the guitar and playing the blues, which sets him at odds with his stern preacher father. 

There are two halves to Sinners and any film with this kind of structure, especially one where the tone and even genre shift drastically, risks being uneven or a letdown in one way or another. From Dusk Til Dawn is a perfect example of this: the general consensus is that the first half of the movie with the gangster brothers is superior to the vampire action second half. The two halves are so distinct that they seemingly have little to do with each other and many people wished the whole movie was just about the gangster brothers. Sinners does not suffer from this problem. It does not feel uneven or disjointed. All of the character work and relationships of the first half of the movie are not thrown out for the second half. The actions and fates of the characters are informed by everything that has come before. Coogler’s Oscar nominated original screenplay never goes on autopilot. 

The marketing was secretive about just what specific type of horror faced the characters. Yet, it was never meant to be a secret, and certainly isn’t now, that this is a vampire movie. The film itself only speaks of evil and devil in vague terms at first. Aside from some quick imagery at the beginning, nothing supernatural happens for the first 40 minutes, but Sinners is not hiding that it is a horror movie. It takes its time getting to the horror but it does not waste that time. 

A prologue tells us how there can be people so gifted at making music that it conjures spirits of the past and the future and it can also attract evil. Sammie “Preacherboy” is such a person. The film's signature sequence of has Preacherboy’s music fulfilling the promise of the prologue in a dazzling and transcendent scene that should not work, that would be silly and pretentious in a lesser movie, but all of the right notes are hit in just the right way and the result is movie magic. 

Preacherboy is also the lynchpin between the story of the brothers and their nightclub and the assault of vampires who are drawn by his music. The mysterious party crashers are led by Remmick (Jack O'Connell), who also plays and enjoys music and speaks about equality and unity, about relieving pain and saving people. The best villains never see themselves as villains but Remmick only barely conceals his sinister and monstrous nature. More than victims and blood, he seeks to consume an entire person and their gifts and background and culture. The vampires have a collective mind, but it is clear that Remmick’s clan is not a round table.

Michael B. Jordan makes playing twins seem easy. It helps that they are dressed similarly but distinctly (Smoke wears blue; Stack wears red) and after their introduction they spend time apart allowing their personalities to grow. Jordan’s performance is what distinguishes the twins. It is no surprise he has earned a Best Actor Oscar nomination. It is also no surprise that the other standout performance comes from Delroy Lindo as Delta Slim, a drunken blues musician whose drunkenness and weary face show the pain and tribulations he has endured. Lindo has earned a Supporting Actor nomination, surprisingly the first of his long and impressive career. 

Sinners fits nicely under the pretentious term “elevated horror” that gets applied to arthouse horror films that receive awards and are liked by serious, scholarly critics. This is an “elevated horror” movie in the same way that Leonard Maltin describes the Astaire/Rogers musicals of the 1930’s as escapism that elevates the soul. The truth is that Sinners is a great movie whether you want to analyze it for themes and subtext or want to watch a tense, bloody vampire movie. Ryan Coogler made a horror movie that exceeds all expectations, as a horror fan I can’t ask for more than that. 

Sinners is streaming on HBOmax.

Nominees: Zinzi Coogler, Sev Ohanian, Ryan Coogler

Director: Ryan Coogler Screenplay: Ryan Coogler Cast: Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Caton, Jack O'Connell, Wunmi Mosaku, Delroy Lindo Production Company: Proximity Media Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures Release Date: April 18th, 2025 Total Nominations: 16, including Best Picture Other Nominations: Actor-Michael B. Jordan; Director-Ryan Coogler; Original Screenplay-Ryan Coogler; Supporting Actor-Delroy Lindo; Supporting Actress-Wunmi Mosaku; Cinematography-Autumn Durald Arkapaw; Production Design-Hannah Beachler (production designer), Monique Champagne (set decorator); Costume Design-Ruth E. Carter; Editing-Michael P. Shawver; Makeup and Hairstyling-Ken Diaz, Michael Fontaine, Shunika Terry; Original Score-Ludwig Göransson; Original Song-"I Lied to You", music and lyrics by-Ludwig Göransson, Raphael Saadiq; Sound-Chris Welcker, Benjamin A. Burtt, Felipe Pacheco, Brandon Proctor, Steve Boeddeker; Visual Effects-Michael Ralla, Espen Nordahl, Guido Wolter, Donnie Dean; Casting-Francine Maisler

Best Pictures #123: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Hamnet

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #123: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Hamnet

"These but the trappings and suits of woe."

Hamnet begins with a note explaining that the names Hamnet and Hamlet were interchangeable. It gives no such note about the names Anne and Agnes, which it seems were interchangeable as well: Anne Hathaway, later Anne Shakespeare, was referred to in her father's will as Agnes; the film refers to her only as Agnes (pronounced Ayn-yes). I suppose it does not matter whether she was Anne or Agnes because we do not really get to know this character or her husband, Will. This is really too bad because the point of the movie is to make the audience share in their grief over their son Hamnet, who died at the age of 10. This film, and the novel it is based on by Maggie O'Farrell, who co-wrote the screenplay with director Chloe Zhao, suggest that out of that grief Shakespeare was inspired to write his most famous play, Hamlet.

Jessie Buckley plays Agnes, whose mother was rumored to be a forest witch (more of a slander than, at the time, a serious legal accusation) and who herself is deeply connected to the natural world. The opening shot of the movie is of her barefoot and asleep nestled in the root of a gargantuan and ancient tree. To give birth to her first child, a girl, Susanna, she hobbles out to the woods alone. She is unable to do so for the birth of the twins, Judith and Hamnet. 

Paul Mescal plays Will, a mediocre glovemaker, part time tutor, and aspiring poet and writer. The movie goes to great pains to avoid the names William and Shakespeare. When we finally do hear the name “William Shakespeare” it is played as though the full identity of Anne/Agnes’s husband is a great revelation or even a twist. This would make sense and be acceptable if Hamnet was really meant to tell the story of an average Renaissance era woman and did not depend, moreover require, you to know, if only vaguely, who Shakespeare was and that his most famous play is Hamlet in order to have any pathos at all. 

It seems that Buckley and Mescal were not meant to play people so much as vessels for grief and woe. Agnes is not presented as especially witchy, but she does have a vision that at her deathbed only two children will be at her side. So, when the newborn girl seems stillborn then finally breathes, Agnes believes that Judith is marked for death. However, we the audience know that Hamnet is the child fated to die (because that is the premise of the movie), so it is only a shock to Agnes, not the audience, and plays like a cruel joke only meant to increase her pain and suffering. It does not enhance the drama of the movie. Jessie Buckley is almost certain to win the Best Actress Oscar, but I never felt that Agnes was a full character, much less a person that really lived. A scene of Will in London consumed by grief as he stands at the edge of the Thames River and speaks the “To be or not to be” soliloquy made my eyes nearly roll out of my head.

The pacing never felt slow and very few scenes felt extraneous, yet afterwards I wondered how this movie took up 2hours and 5 minutes. Until Hamnet’s death from the plague, the movie is scenes of day to day life in a rural Renaissance era English village, specifically around one cottage. The romance between Agnes and Will is sweet and passionate; both feel like outsiders in their families and their community. Agnes encourages Will’s move to London because she believes he is meant for more. However, we do not get any hint of his potential greatness; at least a sonnet would have helped. All we get is a scene of him so frustrated with writer’s block that he wakes their baby. 

The most exciting part of Hamnet is the performance of Hamlet at the Globe theater. This is meant to be the great catharsis of the movie for both Will and Agnes, but it does not work. Agnes behaves as though she is an alien just arrived on earth and has no idea what the hell a play is. She shouts at the actor playing Hamlet. She frantically and confusedly speaks to her brother and the stage itself so loudly that even the groundlings, notorious for their rowdiness, shush her. We know from a scene earlier in the movie, where the children act out what would become the Weird Sisters/Witches opening scene of MacBeth, that Agnes is familiar with the idea of a performance and of people pretending. I applaud Buckley for playing this straight but that is far from the same as saying she should be nominated or win the Best Actress Oscar. 

Hamnet is absolutely not how Shakespeare came up with Hamlet. Of course Shakespeare in Love is absolutely not how he came up with Romeo and Juliet either, but that film behaves as though it knows everything it is showing you is made up. Hamnet takes itself too far too seriously without giving you anything, aside from the premise, to stand on. Shakespeare left no diaries or letters for later generations to know what he thought and how he felt. This is a gift to modern storytellers who want to make Shakespeare into whatever they will. This one falls flat. Every high school student has the same reaction when they find out that Shakespeare’s son was named Hamnet and his most famous play is Hamlet–at least currently, as Shakespeare’s most popular play changes with whatever the era. This story would have you believe that Hamnet's death and the production of Hamlet happened one after the other. In reality four years passed between Hamnet’s death and the first performance of Hamlet. Shakespeare was much more likely cashing in on the trend of “revenge plays” like The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd. Shakespeare wrote plays about fathers and sons before Hamlet and did so after. His last sole authored play, The Tempest, is about a father and daughter; Shakespeare’s daughters have little purpose in this movie. A much more moving and affecting version of everything Hamnet is striving for has already been put on screen in Kenneth Branagh's All is True (2018)–a movie I assure you exists–which has all the insight and pathos that Hamnet lacks.

Hamnet is streaming on Peacock.

Nominees: Liza Marshall, Pippa Harris, Nicolas Gonda, Steven Spielberg, Sam Mendes, producers

Director: Chloé Zhao

Screenplay: Chloé Zhao & Maggie O'Farrell; based on the novel by Maggie O'Farrell

Cast: Jessie Buckley, Paul Mescal, Emily Watson

Production Companies: Hera Pictures, Neal Street Productions, Amblin Entertainment, Book of Shadows

Distributor: Focus Features

Release Date: November 26th, 2025

Total Nominations: 8, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Actress-Jessie Buckley; Director-Chloé Zhao; Adapted Screenplay-Maggie O'Farrell, Chloé Zhao; Production Design-Fiona Crombie (production designer), Alice Felton (set decorator);  Costume Design-Malgosia Turzanska; Original Score-Max Richter; Casting-Nina Gold

Best Pictures #122: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: The Secret Agent

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #122: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

The Secret Agent

“Our story is set in the Brazil of 1977, a period of great mischief…”

The Secret Agent has intrigue, characters with mysterious backgrounds and multiple identities, characters on the lam, hired assassins, secret meetings, escape plans that need fake passports, corrupt authority figures, and underground networks, but it is not a spy movie. If the titular 'secret agent' is anybody, it’s Jean-Paul Belmondo in the 1973 film Le Magnifique, also titled, The Man From Acapulco, The Magnificent One, and The Magnificent Secret Agent, in which he plays an author who has elaborate and ridiculous fantasies about being a spy. We see a clip of the trailer at the movie theater where one of the characters works. Perhaps it was unintentional but no less fitting that director Kleber Mendonça Filho included a reference to a movie that had different names for different locations. The main character of The Secret Agent also goes by different names in different locations. 

This is an incredibly well crafted film set in 1977 in Brazil during its military dictatorship about how the realities of living under a dictatorship have forced ordinary people to behave and act like they are a secret agent in a spy movie. So, Marcelo (Wagner Moura) does more or less everything you might expect a secret agent to do. We do not learn his backstory for a long time but we never really get the impression that he is a spy or anything close to it. As I mentioned before, there is mystery and intrigue, and even a shoot out, but this is far from an action movie. It is a moving drama that you hope never turns into a thriller because of what it would mean for the characters. 

When Marcelo returns to the city of Recife at the start of Carnivale he is greeted with surprise and even apprehension by nearly everyone he meets, except for his young son Fernando. We come to learn that Marcelo is not his real name, that he is mourning the loss of his wife, wants to leave Brazil with his son, and his only friends and allies are those who are also out of favor with the state. In a moving scene at the apartment of Dona Sebastiana (Tânia Maria), an elderly woman who provides shelter and assistance to those on the run, one after one reveals that they are under a death threat. Marcelo is set up with a job at the identification documents institute where he searches for evidence to prove that his mother existed; we never learn the full story of her disappearance. This could be a whole movie in itself but Marcelo is only there to bide time until he can flee Brazil with his son. 

What really makes The Secret Agent something special is that it is filled with so many characters, who, no matter their screen time, could be the main character of their own movie. There is Marcelo's father-in-law who works at the movie theater and looks after Fernando; There is Elza, a member of the underground resistance who interviews Marcelo and tries to arrange his passport; There is Dona Sebastiana and everyone she gives shelter to. There is the German Hans (Udo Kier in his final performance for one intense and powerful scene) who the obnoxious and corrupt local police chief likes to show off like an oddity because he believes Hans is a former Nazi soldier (Hans is actually a Holocaust survivor).  The police chief and his son and adopted son are the contacts for the pair of hitmen hired to kill Marcelo. The Secret Agent is among the first films to receive an Oscar nomination in the brand new Best Casting Oscar category. This nomination is most well earned and is my pick for what film should win. 

The story is divided into three chapters with an unofficial prologue that is a brilliant short film in itself. Marcelo stops at a gas station where there is a dead body on the ground half covered by a piece of cardboard. Police arrive but they do not care about the body. They inspect Marcello’s car looking for something to charge him with and force a bribe. When they find out Marcello has no cash they settle for his cigarettes and leave. This perfectly sets up the realities of the time and place we are about to see.  

There is also, unexpectedly but calculatedly, a storytelling device that introduces a plotline in the present day. It is jarring at first and each time the film cuts back to this storyline it feels something like a commercial break. However, this plotline does provide the conclusion and catharsis. More importantly, it ties the events of the past to the present. 1977 is nearly 50 years ago which is more than a long time to most people, but by joining the story of Marcelo in the past to the researcher today, the film confronts the audience with the fact that the terrible and oppressive past really was not that long ago. It still affects people today and perhaps resonates so strongly because the corruption and oppression feel unfortunately familiar at present. This happened not that long ago, so why can’t it happen again?

The Secret Agent is available to stream on Disney+/Hulu and to rent on Amazon Prime.

Nominees: Emilie Lesclaux, producer

Director: Kleber Mendonça Filho

Screenplay: Kleber Mendonça Filho

Cast: Wagner Moura, Carlos Francisco, Tânia Maria

Production Companies: CinemaScópio, MK Productions, One Two Films, Lemming Film, Arte France Cinéma

Distributor: Neon

Release Date: December 5th, 2025

Total Nominations: 4, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Actor-Wagner Moura; Best International Feature; Casting-Gabriel Domingues

Best Pictures #121: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein (2025)

by A.J.

Best Pictures #121: 2025 (98th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Frankenstein (2025)

"What manner of creature is that? What manner of devil made him?"

I am a fan of director Guillermo del Toro, however, it always seems to be a coin flip whether I'll like his next movie or not. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is one of my favorite books and holds the rare distinction of being a book I have read more than once. So, I was more trepidatious than excited to see del Toro's adaptation of Frankenstein. There have been so many Frankenstein movies from the silent short in 1910 to the landmark Universal monster movie in 1931 to many, many more and now to del Toro. With so many versions of Mary Shelley's story, so many variations, so many re-imaginings, do we really need one more? The answer is yes, if it is this one.

It’s no surprise that this was a passion project for del Toro, who has been obsessed with the novel and 1931 film, directed by James Whale, since childhood. His wonderfully macabre visual style, approach to certain themes, and ability to create sympathetic portrayals of monsters make Frankenstein the perfect story for him to tell. Even more than Pan's Labyrinth or The Shape of Water, this feels like the ultimate Guillermo del Toro movie. It is the movie he was meant to make. 

The plot is, dare I say, familiar. I read some reviews that claimed this adaptation was more faithful to the novel, which is a sign that someone has not read the novel. This is something that gets said whenever a movie includes the framing device of the arctic expedition that discovers Frankenstein and the Creature. del Toro's adaptation does begin with an arctic expedition trapped in the ice that comes upon a weary and ailing Victor Frankenstein who tells his woeful tale to the captain. Of course, del Toro makes sure that the Creature also gets to tell his tale. 

In this version, young Victor Frankenstein learned the basics of medicine from his cold and demanding father (played by Charles Dance, of course). At university Victor’s (Oscar Isaac) boundary pushing experiments and ideas catch the attention of the eccentric Harlander (Christoph Waltz), who agrees to bankroll Frankenstein’s experiment to create a new and improved man. Frankenstein becomes infatuated with Harlander’s niece, Elizabeth (Mia Goth), who is engaged to his younger brother, William. The movie takes its time before the Creature is introduced; fortunately none of that time is wasted and Jacob Elordi as the Creature does not disappoint. 

Like Sofia Coppola in Priscilla, del Toro uses Elordi’s 6’5” stature to overwhelming effect. The special makeup effects are quite impressive (Make Up and Hairstyling are just one of a total 9 Oscar nominations), and all the more impressive because they do not hide or distract from Elordi’s performance. He effectively conveys the longing and anger of the Creature so well articulated in Mary Shelley’s novel. Elordi has earned a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination, the film’s only acting nomination. Neither a trophy nor a damsel, Mia Goth as Elizabeth is the promise of comfort and safety and love for Victor, William, and the Creature. Her compassion is the first kindness that the Creature knows. Oscar Isaac is at his best when playing mad scientists (see also Ex Machina for further proof and another excellent performance not nominated by the Academy). Isaac is delightfully over the top, clearly having fun with the role, and the movie benefits from it. Frankenstein is audacious, rakishly charming, arrogant and also selfish, abusive, and cowardly. One of the first things he does with the Creature is to put it in chains in the laboratory basement. His arc from protagonist to essentially a villain is done with care and Isaac handles Victor’s complexity very well. 

Both the Production Design and Costumes received Oscar nominations, and rightfully so. The story is set in the 1850’s, though things are not quite period accurate. They are, however, accurate to del Toro’s sensibilities. An elaborate statue of an archangel comes to fiery life during a nightmare (inspired by a real waking nightmare del Toro had as a child). The former armory turned laboratory is a bizarre and impractical but visually stunning tower on the edge of a cliff. There is a large chute down the middle from the top of the tower to the basement–reminiscent of the hole in the roof of the estate in Crimson Peak, itself inspired by Poe’s The Fall of House of Usher–that I can’t imagine would serve any real purpose. The costumes, especially Mia Goth’s gowns, follow this same outlandish but eyecatching style.

There is enough of the novel in this adaptation to satisfy a fan like me. There is also enough that is new and different that a viewer, horror fan or not, won't feel like they're watching the same old story. Though one of the great pillars of horror literature and cinema, the Frankenstein story is more macabre and spooky (gothic, you might say) than scary. The best film adaptations tune into Shelley's sympathy for the Creature and that Victor is actually a mad scientist, and even a villain. Mary Shelly created a thematically complex story and that is not lost in del Toro’s version. This movie gets gory and violent at times and it is perfect for a dreary day, a stormy night, or any time you’re in a spooky mood.

Frankenstein is available to stream on Netflix.

Nominees: Guillermo del Toro, J. Miles Dale, Scott Stuber, producers

Director: Guillermo del Toro

Screenplay: Guillermo del Toro; based on Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley

Cast: Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Mia Goth, Christoph Waltz

Production Companies: Double Dare You, Demilo Films, Bluegrass 7

Distributor: Netflix

Release Date: October 17th, 2025

Total Nominations: 9, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Supporting Actor-Jacob Elordi; Adapted Screenplay-Guillermo del Toro; Cinematography-Dan Laustsen; Production Design-Tamara Deverell (production designer), Shane Vieau (set decorator); Costume Design-Kate Hawley; Makeup and Hairstyling-Mike Hill, Jordan Samuel, Cliona Furey; Original Score-Alexandre Desplat; Sound-Greg Chapman, Nathan Robitaille, Nelson Ferreira, Christian T. Cooke, Brad Zoern