My Top 25 Movies and Series of 2025

I have twenty-five films and series to recommend.  These are dramas I watched in 2025, but many were produced much earlier. Some are less well-known and under-the-radar.  Here are the reviews I wrote this past year with the criteria that they were available for streaming free.  Of the 44 reviews I posted this year, these are my favorites, my “listicle”.  As in past years, both television and cinema have continued to produce phenomenal story-telling and intriguing characters. And this year many of the foreign films and series I watched could have easily fallen into my “Psychological, Political, and Sociological” category.  I listed them under Foreign because of limited circulation and publicity for these films as well as the fact that some viewers do not like to watch movies and series with subtitles or dubbed dialogue.

The Book-to-Screen category lists reviews directly based on a book although there is a liminal zone of films and series inspired by books which have been included in the “Psychological” category instead.

The following list is not ranked, only grouped by genre and date of review.  

FOREIGN CINEMA

1. The Gardener (Spanish: El Jardiniero) –Root Rot?? (April 28, 2025) 

A quiet studious young gardener lives with his mother, China, owner of a nursery. He has frontal lobe damage from a car accident.  Avoiding a fatal end, the mother and son become inexorably intertwined in a cat-and-mouse game of murder. 

2. Secrets We Keep–Lies and Privilege? (June 22, 2025)

This Danish mini-series is a brutal, eviscerating  reflection of how the wealthy belittle  the very people who keep their lives functioning. Will there be a perpetrator who must face a judicial system?  Or will there be more silence, more looking away and denial?

3. Widow Cliquot–Effervescent Pioneer (June 30, 2025)

The beautiful and analytical-minded widow has an almost magical realism she shared with her now deceased husband.   She is defiant and determined  against great odds, both personal and legal,  to make the Clicquot champagne winery a success.

4. Astrid et Raphaëlle–Extraordinary Attorney Woo Meets Silent Witness (July 8, 2025)

An  underappreciated but extremely perceptive woman police officer, Raphaëlle surmises that a librarian, Astrid, just may be the most brilliant crime solver she has ever met. Astrid is on the Aspberger’s spectrum with a passion for puzzles.   

5. Néro the Asssassin– A Slayer and Hero (November 3, 2025)

Néro.abandoned his infant daughter to an orphanage. Now fourteen years old, the  daughter is ordered by  the Catholic archbishop to be brought to  Ségur by her father.  The journey becomes treacherous as Catholic fanatics believe the young girl is  a descendant of the Devil. 

6. Angry Squad–Civil Servant and Seven Swindlers (November 27, 2025)

A wealthy real estate mogul, Tachibana, is a tax cheat. Jiro Kumazawa is a dedicated tax collector whose  good friend mysteriously dies. Kumazawa wants to collect taxes of over 1Billion yen owed by Tachibana and solve his friend’s murder.

PSYCHOLOGICAL, POLITICAL and SOCIOLOGICAL

7. Juror #2–Trial by Fire or Twelve Angry Men? (January 27, 2025)

Replete with moral ambiguity, self-interest that pits family against social justice, and a  reminder of the fragility of justice when jurors bring their own personal biases and experiences into the courtroom. Can they help themselves and really be impartial?  Jurors are convicting the person as much as the crime. 

8. Six Triple Eight–Hidden Figures?  (February 16, 2025)

The inspiring story of 855 women who overcame immense barriers to sort over seventeen million pieces of backlogged mail during World War II.  Sorting the mail became a priority to boost morale by ensuring soldiers stayed connected with loved ones. 

9. Descendant–The Last Slave Ship (March 16, 2025)

Discovered more than 200+ years after the ship’s sinking,  the ship Clotilda inspired the creation of Africatown,  an independent all-Black community.  Originally established to seek refuge and solace from the slavers in Mobile,  Clotilda descendants now are determined to  preserve the US history that has been erased. 

10. Adolescence–A Parent’s Heartbreak

A psychological crime drama focusing on how the arrest of a thirteen-year old boy for murder affects his family and classmates.  Acknowledges the parental doubts anyone would experience in this situation.  Every parent’s worst nightmare is nothing short of brutal, evoked especially in the final scene.

11. Red Eye–A Terrifying Flight (July 29, 2025)

Two strangers hook up at a bar for a cozy drink before boarding. At first the flirtation begins as seatmates on the flight. Then action in the economy class becomes claustrophobic as the two strangers are trapped in a menacing cabin cat-and-mouse game.

12. Code of Silence–Read My Lips    (September 1, 2025)

A British crime drama with startling performances by some deaf actors. Alison eavesdrops on a criminal gang, mostly through watching CCTV footage.   She scrutinizes facial expressions, observes their body language and reads lips. Like any good detective, Alison must study the scene, piecing together clues.

13. Wednesday–Mother-Daughter Witchery (September 15, 2025) 

Family saga [in a gothic Edgar Allen Poe-like setting] will see the impact of family lies and secrets from one generation to another,  A grandma-to-mother-to- daughter concert of catastrophes and betrayals in this retelling of the Addams Family. Absolutely bewitching!

14. Doctor Foster– “Fatal Attraction” or A Woman Scorned (October 5, 2025)

A trusted GP in  London, Dr. Gemma Foster starts to wonder why her husband seems to be getting home later and later.  She suspects her husband is having an affair.  Soon the lies, secrets and betrayals– including from her friends–  begin to consume her, tearing her  world apart. 

15. A Different Man –Beauty  in the Eyes of the Beholder October 13, 2025

Motivated by twin desires–to be a successful actor and an acceptable love interest for a kind and beautiful playwright,– a severely disfigured actor agrees to transformative surgery.  Finding himself with a whole new face, he abandons  his old identity.  

16. The Last Showgirl–Las Vegas or Bust (October 19, 2025)

A fifty-something showgirl, Shelly has made many difficult, messy choices.  She gave her toddler daughter to another family so she could pursue her career on the Las Vegas Strip.  Now regretting that decision, she tries to reconcile with her estranged daughter who is about to graduate from college.  

17. The Task–Stay Focused: “Monk” meets “Slow Horses” (November 10, 2025)

The target is a ruthless drug cartel, aptly named the Dark Hearts. What could go wrong? Highlights the interactions between a highly moral and compassionate man, a deeply flawed and remorseful minor criminal,  and a truly cruel psychopath.  All three  warp and transmute each other’s lives.  

18. Dickensian–A Twist on Sherlock Holmes (December 14, 2025)

A BBC  historical drama mini-series  borrows from several of Charles Dickens’ novels to convincingly interact in ways resonant with his novels’ personalities but woven with new plots into a murder mystery.

BOOK-TO-SCREEN ADAPTATION

19. Conclave–A Sinful Synod(January 6, 2025)

With the death of the  pope, there is a  mandate to appoint a successor through the conclave or synod.   Over one hundred cardinals from all over the globe must choose candidates, one of whom will become the next pope.  The ensuing power struggles within the Catholic Church become more alarming as their secrets and lies surface. 

20. Emilia Pérez–A Gender Bender (February 10, 2025)

Drug lord Manitas desires gender-confirmation surgery in order to transition into Emilia. With her authentic identity, Emilia wishes to have a  positive impact through redemptive political and philanthropic projects on behalf of the countless victims of Mexico’s drug wars. 

21. The Piano Lesson–A Cacophony (March 3, 2025)

A brother and  sister  fight over the sale of their great-grandmother’s heirloom piano.  The brother is in deep debt and wishes to sell the piano to purchase land in order to realize his dream of being a landowner in Mississippi.  His sister refuses, claiming that the piano is their heritage, a legacy embedded with the blood and tears of their ancestors. 

22, Wicked–Behind the Curtain? (May 13, 2025)

A highly original prequel  to The Wizard of Oz.  A reimagination of Elphaba’s childhood before her incarnation  as the Wicked Witch of the West, a family drama engulfing Elphaba. Her harsh father has no love for her, only for Elphaba’s younger sister, who has suffered a tragic catastrophe.

23. A Complete Unknown–Like a Rolling Stone (May 28, 2025) 

A biopic of the musical genius of Bob Dylan in the turbulence of the sixties. A spellbinding time capsule that rewinds life in the early days of one of the most influential artists of our time, Dylan’s true personality remains unknown, with only glimpses or clues. This film is poetry in motion. 

24.  The Girlfriend–Really?  (October 27, 2025)

A pathological–almost sexual– obsession of a mother-son relationship gone berserk. The mother embodies the unraveling of a broken heart, devolving into insanity. And the son’s girlfriend is a  demonic personality:  icy and hyper-rational, calmly damaging her target.  

25. Frankenstein–(November 30, 2025)

This epic will surprise. Doctor Frankenstein  justifies his arrogant and callous ambition to create an immortal being without regard to consequences.  Creator and “monster” switch roles of hunter and hunted, as the “monster” learns to feel the humanity that his creator has lost.

Note:  This list does not include my June 2 review of Handmaid’s Tale (final season), which was eliminated only due to limitations of length.  Truly astonishing cinematic drama at times!