It’s the end of the year so I’m here to give you some of my favorite things this year and to promise that in 2026, I’ll post more. I recently read “On Writing” by Stephen King (which I highly recommend – easily one of my favorite books I’ve ever read) and he points out that it’s hard to write from the soul when your soul is burnt out from your job. My goal in 2026 is to try and regain my spark for writing, creating, and art in general by remembering that a work/life balance is important… But it’s easier said than done. I do know that when I’m writing for this blog, I feel much more joy in life.
Anyway. Onto the post.
As of this moment in time, I have watched 85 new (to me) movies this year. Of these 85 movies, I’ve given 7 one star reviews and 12 five star reviews. The other 66 movies are between 2 and 4 stars. Here is how I rate movies. It’s pretty similar to how I rate books.
- 1 = I’m actually angry I wasted my time on this and I might not have even finished
- 2 = I’m slightly annoyed that I actually wasted time on this
- 3 = This is perfectly and respectfully fine. I can see why people like it and I can see why people don’t. I wouldn’t tell people to watch this but I am not upset I spent time on it.
- 4 = This is a good movie. I enjoyed it and I’d probably tell people to watch it but I probably won’t watch it again.
- 5 = I will tell everyone they should watch this movie. I would watch this movie again. I will annoy you so much that you’ll have to watch this movie to shut me up.
I am easily influenced though. For example, I gave the movie Heat a 1 Star (some of you want to murder me now) because I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited for a movie in my life… and then so incredibly let down. This is a movie that people quote and put on their top movie lists all the time and I was SO JUICED going into it. Had I not heard anything about this movie, I probably would have given it a 2 (lol). But because so many people jerk off to the thought of this movie, I couldn’t bring myself to give it anything higher than a 1. On the same note, you have to go into some movies understanding that they are what they are. For example, are the John Wick movies life changing and Oscar worthy? No. But they’re super fun and a solid 4 Star is fair (but these movies do NOT need to be 3 hours long so I gave the 4th only 3 stars due to extreme and unnecessary length). Looking at my ratings, I gave A Real Pain and Still Alice (two serious movies) 4 stars because they were beautiful movies that made me think and feel deeply. 4 stars is a fun time or a reflective time, I guess.
Here are the top movies I watched (for the first time) in 2025. I’ve taken the liberty of attaching the trailer to each and I cried re-watching many of these:
- Past Lives – 5
- The Usual Suspects – 5
- The Substance – 5
- Conclave – 5
- Howl’s Moving Castle – 5
- Sinners – 5
- Flow – 5
- Portrait of a Lady on Fire – 5
- Spirited Away – 5
- Dinner in America – 5
- The Worst Person in the World – 5
- The Count of Monte Cristo (2024) – 5
Yes. I just watched Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, and The Usual Suspects for the first time. I am behind. These 3 movies have always been hyped up and they are 10000000% hyped up for a reason. They’re phenomenal. I’m already kicking myself for spending so much of my life without being able to have these movies in my brain. I cannot wait for Willow to be enthralled by Howl’s Moving Castle and Spirited Away. She’s going to lose her mind.
While The Substance, Sinners, and Conclave were predictably good – I had expected to enjoy them. Flow and Past Lives pleasantly surprised me. Those were 2 emotional journeys I had no idea I was going to take. I don’t even really like cats but I was shedding tears while on the edge of my seat for our little kitty in Flow.
That all being said, there are 4 movies that really shone for me this year:
- Portrait of a Lady on Fire
- The Worst Person in the World
- Dinner in America
- The Count of Monte Cristo (2024)
I only knew about these movies because I have a Letterbox’d account (laurenkaleo – add me, don’t judge me) and found them. I added them to my list as movies that were highly rated. All 3 blew my FUCKING MIND. Let’s get into it.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire: “Do all lovers feel they’re inventing something?” – If you don’t want to immediately watch this after that quote, I don’t know what to do with you. What about this one? “In solitude, I felt the liberty you spoke of. But I also felt your absence.” Did you want to cry uncontrollably today? If so, watch this movie. Even if you don’t want to, you should still watch this movie. I have never felt so many different feelings while watching a movie in my life. I was horrified, angry, excited, flustered, disappointed, sad, happy, frustrated… If it’s a feeling, I probably felt it while watching this movie. It is about an artist who is hired to paint a portrait of a young woman (who lives on an isolated island) for her wedding portrait for her future husband. It’s immediately evident that Heloise does not want to marry this man. Female directors are so incredibly powerful and yet so underrated. Celine Sciamma is everything that’s right with female directors and the reason why female directors should be more popular, celebrated, and given funds to do shit. I don’t think I took a SINGLE BREATH for the last 15 minutes of this movie. I found out that France didn’t send this movie to be considered for the Oscars and I now have some serious beef with the country of France. I had to look up the amount of men in this movie and it looks like there’s 2 and neither actually have a name. I love it. Everything about this movie is beautiful. The words, scenery, costumes, actresses, story… everything is rich and beautiful and fleeting and tragic and my GOD it’s just wonderful. It’s fresh without being at all new because these stories were told behind closed doors while telling the world that they were just best friends. And as I said to a friend: “We’re all lesbians when we watch this movie. Even gay men.”
The Worst Person in the World: This movie was like talking to a good friend, or rather, talking to the younger sister I never had. I think that watching this in my 30s is a different experience than if I had seen this movie in my 20s. I wanted to yell at Julie while also telling her to live her life to the fullest and make mistakes and love as many people as possible and just enjoy life because you don’t get a second shot at this. I don’t normally enjoy movies that don’t have more plot than “follow this person along their life path where nothing REALLY happens but everything happens” and then I realized that I don’t actually like when that movie is about a man. At this point, I should say that I swear I don’t hate men (my husband is pretty cool) but I am exhausted of a lifetime of all these “must watch live changing movies” that are just a “day in the life” being about an incredibly mediocre man and it’s time that we have more movies that are like this and about women (mediocre or not). This movie follows Julie along her life path for four years, as she navigates trying to figure out who she wants to be in the world while also figuring out who she wants with her along the journey. She can be selfish and rude and idiotic but also kind and considerate and creative. She’s young and she has so much of her life ahead of her. One of the quotes that stuck with me was “You seem to be waiting for something. I don’t know what” and while it’s simple, it really does encompass feeling lost. You feel like you’re constantly waiting for something. That desire to have a child (or children). The love of your life to walk through the door and you just KNOW. That feeling of passion and finding what career you want to do for the rest of your life. The thing that makes your life worth living. Ugh. It’s just so beautiful and so relatable and so well done and who hasn’t thought they were the worst possible person in the world for choosing themselves?
Dinner in America: Hey cool so now that I have your attention because you’ve been crying for hours due to my 2 previous movie recommendations… It’s time for some comic relief. I found this movie because I will watch anything Kyle Gallner is in. He’s Beaver from Veronica Mars (iykyk) and I’ve been following his forward trajectory ever since. I’m so happy that his talent is being recognized. This movie could take place in like, 1994 or 2024. Who knows because it’s set in the mid-West and nothing makes sense. I will say that I spent far too much of this movie wondering the year it’s set in and I’m going to tell you now that you need to just forget about that and not care. Simon and Patty are on a journey to… do a lot of shit. Patty just wants to not be treated like a freak for once and go to a punk rock show and Simon is on the run after burning down a house. It’s got romance. It’s got comedy. It’s got unexpectedly fantastic music. This movie really is proof that you’ll never be too weird for the right person. Patty’s character isn’t the manic pixie dream girl (this is not that type of movie). She’s a neurodivergent woman who has been treated like a child (at best) or a complete idiot (at worst) by everyone around her. She’s awkward and you’re often uncomfortable (at first) with her. But Simon doesn’t treat her like a child (because she’s not) or an idiot (because she’s not). Instead he treats her with respect and helps her to own her own power because not a single other person in her life ever tried that approach. Simon slowly becomes a complete softie because he falls for Patty and he falls for all of her – even for her “weird” behavior. He doesn’t try to infantilize her or make her feel stupid. Sorry, now I think I realize that Simon is the manic pixie dream girl in this movie. Good for him.
The Count of Monte Cristo (2024): This movie is an example of why movies should be made. Every single thing about it is perfect. The storyline. The entire cast (I hope that whoever cast this movie has a wonderful and amazing life filled with comfortable beds and the best parking spot no matter where they go). The filming locations. The cinematography. The COSTUMES (I would DIE for Haydee’s closet). The hair and makeup design. I could go on and on and list each second of the movie as perfection. One of my favorite movies ever is the 2000 version of The Count of Monte Cristo. I could likely recite that entire movie to you, that’s how many times I have seen it. And while I will always love that movie for its ease, simplicity, and happy ending, this movie blows it out of the water with its perfection. Due to having a small feral child running around, this did actually take me 3 days to watch because I wanted to really watch it (and it’s 3 hours long), which meant I had to rent it twice from Kanopy (worth it). This movie is incredibly different from the 2000 version and I must confess that I have never read the book (I did just recently obtain it for free so I’m hoping to start it soon). I don’t know which is more book accurate but I don’t think that I’ll actually care. This movie is so damn beautiful that I can’t complain either way. In case you don’t know the plot of The Count of Monte Cristo, it’s about a man who was betrayed by everyone close to him and is sent to a prison (he’s innocent of the crimes he’s accused of) on an island – a place you put people to forget about them. Worse than death. After more than a decade in there (and by befriending another inmate), he escapes and starts his plan of revenge upon every person who betrayed him. I’m a Scorpio. I love revenge.
Thanks for making it this far! It was a long one, I know. After having written this list out and thought back on them, I realize that I immediately want to go and re-watch all of my 5 star movies from this year! They were all that good! I only watched Dinner in America with my husband so I may force him to subtitle it up and watch the other 3 with him.
Writes with Wolves 