The Belated Mid-Year Top 5

Every year as we move through, I like to do a check-in around the halfway point as to what the best movies of the year are. Unfortunately, we are about a month late at this point but it's still worth looking back at what the best movies of the year so far are. Of course, we will still keep this within the usual parameters, which are based only on the first half of the year. This means it only takes into consideration theatrically released movies that had their broad release between January 1st and June 30th, 2025.

Honorable Mention: The Phoenician Scheme

The Phoenician Scheme may be the weakest of Wes Anderson's recent movies (Asteroid City and The French Dispatch), but even a bad Wes Anderson movie is still entertaining. I had never seen Mia Threapleton in anything before this movie, but she's easily the breakout star of 2025, holding her own alongside seasoned actors like Michael Cera and Benicio Del Toro.

5. Black Bag

Looking for a solid low-budget thriller with an all-star cast? Black Bag is the movie for you. Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett carry this film and a tight, smart script will keep the viewer guessing the whole time. Black Bag is methodical, without a single wasted frame or scene, which makes it one of the best movies of 2025 so far.

4. F1

I've never been a racing fan, but I do always love a good sports movie. F1 is Mad Max at its core. It's the wandering stranger who comes into town to help with a problem and then moves on to the next town. The chemistry between Brad Pitt and, well, everyone in the cast is magnetic, and Joseph Kosinski brings all his skills to direct big-budget action sequences in vehicles, making this a must-watch movie.

3. Thunderbolts*

Thunderbolts* underperformed at the box office because of a series of poor marketing decisions by Marvel Studios. You'd think that watching what happened with Birds of Prey back in 2020 would have told them that naming the movie poorly would have a negative impact at the box office, yet here we are. Regardless, it is the strongest superhero movie of the first half of the year because it does a fantastic job of taking a cast of disparate characters and giving them a relatable emotional arc to the point that I actually want to see more John Walker and Red Guardian in the future. Plus, the idea that an Avengers movie is centered around the team helping someone handle their depression really makes for a unique experience for a superhero movie.

2. Materialists

I was concerned going into see Materialists that Dakota Johnson would drag the movie down for me but she plays the role of the listless, lovelorn young adult who is trying to find something missing in her life perfectly. I don't think I've ever seen Chris Evans disappear into a role as well as he does in this movie which is incredibly important because a lot of the key emotional moments at the end of the movie hinge on his performance. The film is a fantastic but misunderstood romance that will hopefully be understood more as time goes on and the incels forget about it.

1. Sinners

With Sinners, Ryan Coogler has cemented himself (as if there was any doubt) as one of the few directors who can sell a movie outside his established genre with just his name. It's one thing to sell a movie, another thing to make one of the best horror movies in recent history. The real success of the movie is not just that it's a great horror movie, but the first half of the movie is a solid drama about a group of variously broken people coming back together to deal with the issues between them. The fact that this beautifully carries through the paranormal aspects makes Sinners something truly special.