Best Pictures #128: My Pick for Best Picture of 2025

by A.J.

 Best Pictures #128: My Pick for Best Picture of 2025

The 98th Academy Awards

The 98th Academy Awards ceremony for films released in 2025 was held on March 15th, 2026. Conan O'Brien once again hosted, bringing his lively persona and humor to the ceremony; all of the non-Conan related comedy, such as forced banter between presenters, fell flat. Sound problems seemed to persist throughout the ceremony, most notably during Barbara Streisand's spoken tribute to the late, great Robert Redford; when it was time for her to sing, Barbara had a different microphone. 

Before the ceremony even began this was already a historic Academy Awards with Sinners earning the most nominations of any film in Academy history. This indeed did turn out to be a historic Academy Awards ceremony for a few different reasons. The frontrunner for Original Song, Golden from K-Pop Demon Hunters, won to no one's surprise; but it became the first K-Pop song to win an Academy Award. Sinners won only 4 of its 16 nominations, but one of them was for Autumn Durald Arkapaw for Cinematography, making her the first woman to win that category. Sinners also won Best Actor for Michael B. Jordan, Original Screenplay for Ryan Coogler, and Original Score for Ludwig Göransson. A rare tie, only the 7th in the 98years, in the Live Action Short category, between The Singers and Two People Exchanging Saliva, shook things up, and no doubt helped certain Oscar pools. Amy Madigan now holds the record for longest gap between nominations with 40 years passing between her Supporting Actress nomination for Twice in a Lifetime and her second nomination for the horror movie Weapons. Thankfully the wait was worth it and she took home the Best Supporting Actress Oscar. 

Overall the class of nominees for 2025 turned out to be eclectic group. Two foreign language movies, The Secret Agent form Brazil and Sentimental Value from Norway) were nominated for both Best Picture and Best International Feature, making that category a bit tricky to predict. Ultimately, Sentimental Value took home to Norway the Best International Feature Oscar. The Academy's aversion to horror is well known so it is very satisfying that two horror films, Frankenstein and Sinners were included in the Best Picture nominees. F1, a big budget crowd pleaser and Train Dreams, a small, thoughtful personal drama, both earned recognition. Marty Supreme, about a table tennis hustler in the 1950's, and Hamnet, about Anne Hathaway/Shakespeare, are both period dramas inspired by fictionalized representations of real people and were included as well. Only the Academy's love of Emma Stone and director Yorgos Lanthimos explain Bugonia's inclusion in the Best Picture nominees. Paul Thomas Anderson's One Battle After Another ended up being the big winner of the night, taking home 6 Oscars, including the big award, Best Picture. 

My Pick for Best Picture of 2025: One Battle After Another

It's no secret that I am a fan of writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson; I have been since I saw Magnolia in theaters when I was 14. He has long been on the Academy's radar, earning nominations, without winning, since 1997's Boogie Nights, so his wins for Best Adapted Screenplay, Director, and Best Picture, are, on one hand, a long time coming. On the other, One Battle After Another is a singular cinematic achievement. Anderson is such a talented and skilled filmmaker that any one of his films ranks among the best of its respective year. No matter the subject matter or the setting, his films have the sprawling scope and feel of an epic (with Hard Eight and Punch Drunk Love being the still excellent exceptions). The characters in his movies are allowed complexities and contradictions and unspoken motivations, allowing for captivating performances from the cast. Each P.T. Anderson picture feels like a treat. One Battle After Another is no different. Many things make this movie timely, and thus political, but the core of the movie is about a father and daughter; about parents wanting to protect their children from the problems of the past and realizing that is not possible; about how hope rests in the next generation. This is what will give One Battle After Another a lasting resonance no matter political landscape may be. I can't wait to see this P.T. Anderson movie again and I can't wait to see the next one.