2025 Top 10 Films, 2026 Oscars Predictions/Preferences plus Short Takes on It Was Just an Accident along with some other cinematic topics

Comments by Ken Burke

I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.  However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, but better options are on the horizon.  (Note: Anything in bold blue below [or near purple] is a link to something in the above title or the review.)

My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”

(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the song’s name)

However, if you’d like to know more about rationale of my ratings visit this explanatory site.

 

3/11/2026: Please note postings from Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark will be taking a short break starting next week, but we’ll be back soon.

 I’m finally offering a 2025 Top 10 list, which is still in a bit of a tentative mode because there are a few possibilities that could change the list's contents I haven’t seen yet.  Time constraints prevent me from including links to my previous reviews of these 10, but if you’re interested just consult the Summary of Two Guys Reviews where #1’s in the 5 stars group, #s 2 and 3 are 4½ stars, the rest are all 4 stars.  There are a few notable options that didn’t make my list (such as The Secret Agent, Sentimental Value, Sinners); however, I just couldn’t consider anything to which I’d given only 3½ stars out of 5, despite how they were lauded by others (again, see my Rating Rationale link above).

              

                                   2025 TOP 10 FILMS

1, One Battle After Another                         2. Nuremberg

3. The Life of Chuck                                    4. If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

5. Hamnet                                                    6. Blue Moon

7. Bugonia                                                   8. Frankenstein 

9. Marty Supreme                                       10. Eephus (truly from out in left field)

        

2026 OSCARS PREDICTIONS/PREFERENCES 

 Since this blog began in mid-December 2011 we’ve presented an annual posting of the nominees for each year’s Oscar awards along with predictions for winners and personal preferences if different from the predictions.  However, doing the layout (such as the one for the 2025 Oscars for example) has proven to be more time-consuming than I can now manage (in my surprisingly-hectic life lately), so for brevity/sanity’s sake I’ll refer you to this site (their category order a bit different from mine) for the nominees and the listings below for the predictions (in red)—even when I’m taking chances with categories where I haven’t seen some/all of the contenders—and my preferences (in green [or a redgreen combo for anything that captures both options]) where I veer away from the prediction (in some categories I just have no favorites).  Generally, I’m satisfied with the Academy’s chosen nominees although for Best Picture I’d drop F1 (mainly because I haven’t seen it), The Secret Agent, Sentimental Value, and (gasp!) Sinners (despite it’s record 16 nominations) in favor of Blue Moon, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, The Life of Chuck, and Nuremberg, while in the Lead Actor group I’d replace Wagner Moura with Russell Crowe in Nuremberg, although none of these substitutions would merit a prediction nor a preference in their categories as I made my final (?) decisions.  After the statuettes are awarded (3/15/26) I’ll add a Winner! notation to this posting for all 24 categories.

PICTURE                                                                      DIRECTOR

One Battle After Another                                               Paul Thomas Anderson (One Battle …)

(choice of the Producers Guild)                                  (choice of the Directors Guild)

                                                                                    

ACTOR                                                                        ACTRESS

Michael B. Jordan (Sinners)                                        Jessie Buckley (Hamnet)

(choice of the Screen Actors Guild)                          (choice of the Screen Actors Guild)

Leonardo DiCaprio (One Battle …)                             Rose Byrne (If I Had Legs I’d Kick You)

 

SUPPORTING ACTOR                                               SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Sean Penn                                                                   Teyana Taylor

(choice of the Screen Actors Guild)                             (SAG choice Amy Madigan, Weapons)

 

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY                                         ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Sinners                                                                        One Battle After Another

(choice of the Writers Guild)                                      (choice of the Writers Guild)

INTERNATIONAL FEATURE                                     CINEMATOGRAPHY

Sentimental Value (Norway)                                       Sinners

 

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE                                      DOCUMENTARY SHORT

The Perfect Neighbor                                                  All the Empty Rooms

 

ANIMATED FEATURE                                               ANIMATED SHORT

K Pop Demon Hunters                                               The Girl Who Cried Pearls

 

FILM EDITING                                                            LIVE ACTION SHORT

One Battle After Another                                            Two People Exchanging Saliva

 

VISUAL EFFECTS                                                     PRODUCTION DESIGN

Avatar: Fire and Ash                                                  Frankenstein

 

ORIGINAL SCORE                                                    ORIGINAL SONG

Sinners                                                                       “Golden” (K Pop Demon Hunters)

 

SOUND                                                                      COSTUME DESIGN

F1                                                                               Frankenstein

One Battle After Another

 

MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING                                 CASTING

Frankenstein                                                              Sinners (I’m still not sure how to judge these)

 I wouldn’t bet too much in an office/friends-watch-party pool based on my attempt at clairvoyance, although over the years I often end up with about 65-70% accuracy (even when some of my successes were based on wild guesses).  I won’t be surprised if Sinners wins more than I’ve predicted, given its many fine qualities, but I just couldn’t flow with the shift from commentary on 1930s racism to a bloody vampire flick.  Awards will air on ABC TV, Sunday 3/15/2026, at 4pm PDT.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

            It Was Just an Accident (Jafar Panahi, 2025)

                                     rated PG-13   104 min.

(The visual quality of the film’s much better than this photo,

but I wanted to show most of the main characters.)

 I’ll close out with what, for me, is extraordinarily short commentary about a film nominated for Oscar’s Best International Feature, one that’s had great CCAL support since it opened in domestic (U.S.-Canada) theaters on October 15, 2025 (making $10.5 million globally since then) after winning the prestigious Palme d’Or top prize at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, then garnering many other awards and nominations along with 98% Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews, a 91% Metacritic average score, yet when I finally saw it my less-than-enthused reaction was the same as I had for The Secret Agent (also RT 98%, MC 91%) and Sentimental Value (RT 97%, MC 86%), all of which get 3½ stars from me as I just couldn’t get that excited about the contents of any of them (maybe my expectations were too high after all of that praise), although you can find plenty of reviews/videos that extol the virtues of them all, so the problem must be with me (a familiar result).  ... Accident’s plot concerns an Iranian man driving home one night, hits a dog, has car trouble, but when he encounters a mechanic that guy’s convinced the driver was his brutal prison guard some years ago, so he captures the man with intent to kill but first rounds up other former prisoners for verification he’s got the right fiend, a tedious process as most of them aren't sure (for full plot details, with Spoilers, go here).  If interested in seeing it, here’s the trailer; it’s available in streaming, free at Hulu, $5.99 rental at Amazon Prime Video.  For me, Oscar’s International category is not truly great.

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts* (scroll to the bottom of this Summary page to see additional info about your wacky critic, Ken Burke, along with contact info and a great retrospective song list).  Overall notations for this blog—including Internet formatting craziness beyond our control—may be found at our Two Guys in the Dark homepage.  If you’d like to Like us on Facebook (yes?) please visit our Facebook page.  We appreciate your support whenever and however you can offer it unto us!  Please also note that to Post a Comment below about our reviews you need to have either a Google account (which you can easily get at https://accounts.google.com/NewAccount if you need to sign up) or other sign-in identification from the pull-down menu below before you preview or post.  You can also leave comments at our Facebook page, although you may have to somehow register with us there in order to comment (FB procedures: frequently perplexing mysteries for us aged farts).

 

*Please ignore previous warnings about a “dead link” to our Summary page because the problem’s been manually fixed so that all postings since July 11, 2013 now have the proper functioning link.

 

If you’d rather contact Ken directly rather than leaving a comment here at the blog please 

use my email address of kenburke409@gmail.com—type it directly if the link doesn’t work.

         

OUR POSTINGS PROBABLY LOOK BEST ON THE MOST CURRENT VERSIONS OF MAC OS AND THE SAFARI WEB BROWSER (although Google Chrome usually is decent also); OTHERWISE, BE FOREWARNED THE LAYOUT MAY SEEM MESSY AT TIMES.

             

Finally, for the data-oriented among you, Google stats say over the past month the total unique hits at this site were 36,072.  (As always, we thank all of you for your ongoing support with hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers.)  Below is a snapshot of where those responses have come from within the previous week (appreciation for the unspecified “Others” also visiting Two Guys’ site):