As much as I love the Oscars, with the glitz and glamour of the red carpet, I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not usually one to actually watch the majority of the movies nominated. This year, however, when my best friend suggested watching all of the Oscar nominees for Best Picture, I jumped at the chance. All in all, we ended up watching the following: “Nickel Boys”, “Wicked”, “Conclave”, “Anora”, “Dune: Part Two”, “A Complete Unknown”, “The Substance”, “The Brutalist” and “Emilia Perez.” We also watched “The Apprentice”, which wasn’t nominated for Best Picture. However, it did end up with a Best Actor nomination for Sebastian Stan playing Donald Trump. We sadly ended up missing “I’m Still Here”, a Brazilian film that’s not available for streaming anywhere in the States. Having watched the majority of the full-length live-action films nominated, here are my thoughts on the 2025 Oscars: good, bad and weird.
The Good
- “Anora” sweep
If there was a clear winner on Oscars night, it was undoubtedly Sean Baker’s “Anora”. “Anora” ended up winning five of the six awards it was nominated for, taking home Best Picture, Best Actress in a leading role for Mikey Madison, Best Director for Sean Baker, Best Original screenplay and Best Editing. Although there has been a fair bit of controversy surrounding the film, namely the decision to not use an intimacy coordinator in a movie about sex work, there’s no doubt that the wins for “Anora” were a fantastic sign for smaller independent movies. Although it was an undeniable hit, making $46 million at the box office worldwide, it was emphasized in the Best Picture speech that “Anora” cost only $6 million to make, with a relatively small crew. Sean Baker also declared “Long live independent film,” which is a message that will hopefully continue as independent artists are encouraged to make the art that they want to make. Additionally, Mikey Madison’s win makes her the first Gen Z actress to win Best Actress in a Leading Role.
- “Wicked”’s performance and wins
As a near lifelong fan of the Broadway musical, I was ecstatic when I heard that Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande were going to be the opening performance. The performance was stunning both visually and vocally, with Ariana delivering a beautiful rendition of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and Cynthia belting out “Defying Gravity” perfectly. The hype the performance brought for “Wicked” was continued when the film won both Best Production Design and Best Costuming. Paul Tazewell’s win for Best Costuming made him the first Black man in the history of the Oscars to win that award. Although I wish “Wicked” had won more, its two were absolutely deserved given how gorgeous the film itself and Paul’s work was.
- Some atypical winners
While a majority of awards were given to movies that I somewhat expected, there were two that stuck out to me— “Flow” winning Best Animated Feature and “The Substance” winning for Best Hairstyling and Makeup. Although I didn’t watch “Flow”, the reaction to the win alone made me want to watch it. “Flow” was made by independent Latvian filmmakers, and it was the country’s first Academy Award win (and nomination) ever. Beyond a very moving acceptance speech and an animated cat holding an Oscar alongside the filmmakers, seeing all of the celebrations in Latvia has been so heartwarming. Besides “Flow” winning against “Inside Out 2” and “The Wild Robot”, “The Substance”’s win for Best Hairstyling and Makeup was also surprising yet welcome. The Academy hardly ever recognizes horror, with some of the most notable horror films of the 21st century lacking nominations, so even one win for a horror film, especially one directed by a woman, was great to see.
The Bad
- Adrien Brody’s word salad
Out of all the acceptance speeches,“Emilia Perez” managed to not be the worst, which is quite a feat. Adrien Brody’s acceptance of his Best Actor in a Leading Role award started off pretty terribly, with him taking his chewed up gum out of his mouth and throwing it at his girlfriend before going up to accept his Oscar, and it somehow got worse. Even as an English major, his speech (at least the pre-music part) seemed kind of jumbled and like he asked ChatGPT to write him the most humble yet self-important speech of all time, but given that I thought his performance in “The Brutalist” was very well-done, I was inclined to chalk it up to nerves and be satisfied with the results of the award. Then, it got so unbelievably pretentious and entitled that I actually walked away liking him less than I did before. After he had already been talking for five minutes, a great deal longer than some of the other winners, the play-off music began, as it did for every other person. Instead of getting off the stage, Adrien instead chose to insist that he was wrapping up and demanded that they turn the music off, as he had “done this before.” He proceeded to thank his parents, which he apparently forgot to do in the first half, and talk about racism and anti-semitism and world peace— all wonderful topics to acknowledge, of course, but I would’ve appreciated it more had it not just seemed like he realized that he only talked about himself and thought that he should add something to seem like a humanitarian. It ended up being five minutes and 40 seconds, the longest in Oscars history, and I walked away from it really wishing that Sebastian Stan or Timothee Chalamet had won for their spot-on portrayals of Donald Trump and Bob Dylan respectively.
- Very vocal wins for “Emilia Perez”
In 2024, “Emilia Perez” was easily the most hated movie that ended up being nominated for countless awards. Beyond accusations of poor representation for the transgender community and Mexico as a whole and the resurfaced insensitive tweets by lead actress Karla Sofia Gascón, the general consensus among the public is that it’s just a bad movie (and as someone who watched the entirety, I can say that I agree). Although it was nominated for 13 awards, the most out of any other movie, it only walked away with two awards. Despite the few awards it won, the acceptance speech for Best Song ended up being one of the most memorable moments of the night. While the speech started off fairly normal, with composers Clément Ducol and Camille Dalmais providing the usual thanks and inspiring words, it quickly devolved into chaos as Dalmais began singing. She sang operatically into the microphone for roughly thirty seconds, with Ducol awkwardly joining in in the background, and even the music that signals the end of a too-long speech couldn’t stop her as she just sang over the music. All in all, it was bizarre, and honestly, the ridiculousness of it all felt like rubbing salt in the wound of “Emilia Perez” winning at all.
- “Nickel Boys” walking away empty-handed
Out of all the movies I watched in 2025, “Nickel Boys” ended up being my favorite, which is something that surprised even me, as I hadn’t heard of it prior to my Best Picture binge-watch. Shot in first-person and following two Black boys at a vicious reform school in the Jim Crow era south, it was brilliantly shot, moving and made me cry hysterically. If I could only recommend one movie from the 10 I watched, it would undoubtedly be this one. “Nickel Boys” was nominated for only two awards, Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, and walked away empty-handed from both. The nomination in of itself was a win for the movie, as it was the lowest grossing Best Picture nominee and was going up against serious heavy-hitters like “Wicked” and “Dune: Part Two.” At the end of the night though, given not only its renowned source material, Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel of the same name, but its brilliant execution, I was just sad that such an important film ended up winning nothing.
Honorary Mention: The Weird
Beyond offensively bad acceptance speeches, the only noticeably weird part of the night was the In Memoriam section. If you were only looking at the pictures and video shown on screen, you would presume it to be nothing more than a moving tribute, which it was. The music, though, was a little distracting. As I was trying to focus on all of the people the industry lost this year, like the great Maggie Smith and Gene Hackman, I was distracted by the ominous orchestral music playing in the background. Rather than sounding somber, it sounded like something out of “Nosferatu.” It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, as the tribute was well-executed other than that, but it was a bit bizarre for the sinister music to make me feel like a killer was about to be revealed.