Do movies matter?
I ask myself that from time to time. Have I been merely dabbling in the toy department of life for the nearly 50 years (yikes!) I’ve been a film critic, or have I engaged in a higher purpose?
Whether I’ve wasted my time (and yours) with my output is up for debate. But, as for the initial question, again and again I come up with the same answer: Yes, movies matter. They matter a lot.
Not all movies, of course. There are times when I’ve had to drag myself to the theater to see a film that looks (from its trailers, advance word, whatever) to be a mediocre rehash of other movies or some exercise in nihilistic posturing. And, more often than not, those suspicions turn out to be correct.
But then there are the films that represent cinema at its best, whether they are intellectually challenging, enlightening, entertaining, uplifting – capturing, and often celebrating, what it is to be human, what it is to be alive.
Given the sorry state of the world, and our country, with daily ravings coming from a certain lunatic in the White House, we need these films more than ever.
And so it fills my heart to listen to my students go into depth discussing the meaning behind such films as “Get Out,” “Moonlight” and “Promising Young Woman.” It fills my heart to observe my fellow members of the Boston Society of Film Critics as they joyfully share their genuine passion for the art form during our annual December awards meeting.
Speaking of the BSFC, this year’s top awards went to “Sinners,” best picture; Ryan Coogler, best director; Ethan Hawke, “Blue Moon,” best actor; Rose Byrne, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You,” best actress; Stellan Skarsgard, “Sentimental Value,” best supporting actor; Amy Madigan, “Weapons,” best supporting actress; “Sentimental Value,” best non-English-language picture. For the complete list: https://bostonfilmcritics.org/2025/12/14/sinners-leads-boston-film-critics-awards-with-four-honors/.
And now, it’s time for my annual top-10 list.
1. “Sentimental Value.” Memories, family dynamics and the pursuit of
Stellan Skarsgard and Renate Reinsve star in “Sentimental Value.” (Neon)
art collide in Danish-Norwegian director Joachim Trier’s breathtaking drama about a filmmaker (Stellan Skarsgard) who re-enters the lives of his two adult daughters (Renate Reinsve, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) after having abandoned them and their mother years earlier to focus on his career. The acting is understated, yet captures deep, intense, complex emotions that, one suspects, even the characters can’t quite sort out. You know, like in real life. Reinsve, who also starred in Trier’s “The Worst Person in the World,” is extraordinary.
2. “Nouvelle Vague.” Richard Linklater’s depiction of the making of Jean-Luc Godard’s groundbreaking 1960 French New Wave classic “Breathless” is a film lover’s dream. Guillaume Marbeck is hilarious as Godard, an insolent, comically self-serious young man who aims for spontaneity by refusing to work with a script and relying on sudden bursts of inspiration.This amuses male lead Jean-Paul Belmondo (Aubry Dullin) and frustrates American female lead Jean Seberg (Zoey Deutch). Shot in Paris in black and white, with a mostly French cast, Linklater’s film has a free-wheeling style and humor similar to that of the film it’s about.
3. “28 Years Later.” The track-star zombies of “28 Days Later” and “28 Weeks Later” are back. Yes, it’s scary as hell – and its brief, brilliant use of a 1915 recording of Rudyard Kipling’s poem “Boots” makes it all the more chilling. But it’s also a compelling coming-of-age drama about a 12-year-old boy asserting his independence while coming to terms with his mother’s illness and his father’s failings, a profound meditation on death, and then, briefly, a kick-ass action film. Directed by Danny Boyle (“Slumdog Millionaire”) and written by Alex Garland (“Ex Machina”), it stars Ralph Fiennes, Jodie Comer and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.
4. “Left-Handed Girl.” Shih-Ching Tsou directed and co-wrote (with Sean Baker) this light drama about a 5-year-old girl (Nina Ye), her older sister (Shih-Yuan Ma) and her mother (Janel Tsai) who move to Taipei and open a noodle stand at a market. The film details the struggles the three encounter against such obstacles as sexism, superstition, financial pressures and family clashes, yet the overall atmosphere is upbeat: These three are survivors, and it’s a pleasure to get to know them.
5. “Train Dreams.” Visual poetry. Clint Bentley directed and co-wrote this subdued drama, adapted from a Denis Johnson novella, about life in rural Idaho as experienced by an Everyman, Robert Grainier (Joel Edgerton). The film traces Robert’s life as an orphan, a railroad worker, a logger, a husband and father, and a carriage driver. Along the way, he experiences love (with his wife, played by Felicity Jones) and various tragedies, and witnesses kindness and cruelty. It’s a history of America, through one man’s existence, that captures the bigness of life in a profound and beautiful way.
6. “Dreams (Sex Love).” This is the part of a trilogy, written and directed by Norwegian Dag Johan Haugerud, which also includes “Sex” and “Love” (neither of which I’ve seen). An Oslo high school girl, Johanne (Ella Overbye), develops a crush on her new French teacher, Johanna (Selome Emnetu). An outside-of-school friendship develops, but does it become something more? Johanne writes a novella which suggests a passionate romance. Is she merely projecting her desires or reflecting the truth? As we consider this, we also are challenged to consider the role of art, conflicting perceptions of reality, and much more.
7. “The Life of Chuck.” Though different in many ways, writer-director Mike Flanagan’s fantasy drama, based on a Stephen King novella, resembles “Train Dreams” in how it movingly captures the enormity of life mostly through the experiences of one person – in this case, Chuck. His story is told in reverse order, starting with Act 3, which links his end with that of the world, and finishing with a first act in which he is orphaned and goes to live with his grandparents (Mark Hamill and Mia Sara). Strange and poignant, the film is enhanced by the narration of Nick Offerman. Tom Hiddleston plays the adult Chuck.
8. “Prime Minister.” Jacinda Ardern served as prime minister of New Zealand for five years. This documentary, from directors Michelle Walshe and Lindsay Utz, gives us a close-up view of Ardern through this period, as she responds to a terrorist attack that kills more than 50 people at a mosque and the COVID pandemic, while also taking progressive approaches to climate change, child poverty, mental illness and other issues. It’s inspiring to see a world leader act with kindness, compassion, dignity and courage, rather than … well, you know.
9. “Eden.” Director Ron Howard presents a stranger-than-fiction true story about three groups of people, all with different motivations, who arrive on a previously uninhabited Galapados island in Ecuador around 1930. Power struggles and violence ensue. The high-voltage cast includes Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Sydney Sweeney, Daniel Bruhl and, best of all, Ana de Armas, who plays a ruthless, self-styled baroness who plans to build a resort for the wealthy on this so-called island paradise.
10. “Sinners.” In writer-director Ryan Coogler’s wildly entertaining, genre-jumping thriller, twins Smoke and Stack (both played by Michael B. Jordan) are 1930s Black gangsters from the Capone mob who return to their hometown in Mississippi to open a juke joint. Predictably, they encounter racism. Not so predictably, they encounter vampires. But with its blend of roadhouse blues as an expression of Black culture, sex, spiritualism, immigrants, the Klan, and other elements, and themes of cultural identity, cultural appropriation and cultural assimilation, this is much more ambitious than a typical horror flick.
Honorable mention: “Blue Moon,” “Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale,” “A Little Prayer,” “Sound of Falling,” “It Was Just an Accident,” “Roofman,” “Frankenstein,” “Sorry, Baby,” “Is This Thing On?” “My Mom Jayne,” “Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore,” “It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley,” “La Grazia,” “Reifenstahl,” “Comparsa,” “Companion,” “Viva Verdi!” “Wake Up Dead: A Knives Out Mystery,” “The Secret Agent,” “Weapons.”
Best performances
Ethan Hawke gives the year’s best performance as Lorenz Hart in “Blue Moon.” (Sabrina Lantos/Sony Pictures Classics)
1. Ethan Hawke, “Blue Moon”
2. Renate Reinsve, “Sentimental Value”
3. Rose Byrne, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”
4. Michael B. Jordan, “Sinners”
5. Ana de Armas, “Eden”
6. Timothee Chalamet, “Marty Supreme”
7. Joel Edgerton, “Train Dreams”
8. Imogen Poots, “The Chronology of Water”
9. Stellan Skarsgard, “Sentimental Value”
10. Jacob Elordi, “Frankenstein”
Honorable mention: Conan O’Brien, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”; Shih-Yuan Ma, “Left-Handed Girl”; Elle Fanning, “Sentimental Value”; Andrew Scott, “Blue Moon”; Amy Madigan, “Weapons.”
** Click here for Tim Miller’s previous movie columns for Cape Cod Wave **
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Tim Miller, Movie Critic
Tim Miller is co-president of the Boston Society of Film Critics and a Tomatometer-approved critic. He teaches film and journalism at Cape Cod Community College in West Barnstable. You can contact Tim at [email protected] or follow him onTwitter @TimMillerCritic. Or you can ignore him completely.
