All 21 French and indie movies I saw in 2025 – ranked!
Yesterday, I discussed big budget and animated films, but today we’re focusing on French movies and author movies. An author movie is a movie that was made by someone who wanted to make art. You can have big budget author movies (like Frankenstein this year), just as you can have small budget not-at-all-author movies.
Before we start, a note on ratings: they’re half emotion, half enjoyment, half depth and half perceived skill. This means the funny movie without a single original thought filmed on a potato will still get a 10 even if it’s obviously shit. Or the weird art movie I didn’t get, but found interesting after I read a few reviews that explained it, with great care taken to the aesthetic of it all, is also a 10.
In general:
More than 9: i fully recommend
More than 7: you should go if it sounds like your stuff
More than 5: good enough
Less than 5: don’t waste your time
Author movies (except French)
One Battle After Another. My favorite part of the movie was the car chase scene, i’d never really cared about a car chase before. Or maybe high DiCaprio trying to remember the password? What I didn’t love was the fetishisation of Black women throughout the movie (Brooke Obie said it all here). 7/10 imdb
The Long Walk. I was touched by the portrayal of boyhood, and what the conversation between the boys told us of them (Emily Spinach said it best here). However I found that the movie was somewhat hypocritical in that it wallowed a bit too much in that violence it pretends to decry. Still, a striking movie! 8/10 imdb
Bugonia. Idk if it’s because it’s still so fresh, but i think it’s my favorite movie of the year. This post by Sabine Carys explains so well the themes, and why i adored it, and this one by Elvia Wilk explains all the criticism i have (but i still love it despite those flaws). 10/10 imdb
September 5. About the 1972 Olympics, following an American sports broadcasting team while they try to adapt to the first live coverage of a terrorist attack. Well executed, with tension to keep us awake, and a good handling on the topic: what do you show in this situation. I went away having been entertained and made to think, so that’s a plus! 7/10 imdb
The Room Next Door. My favorite quiet movie this year. In between all the dinos and fascists and whatnots, this was a welcome gentle story (but very sad). The portrayal of both women was amazing in its nuance and care, and I cried all my tears. 9/10 imdb
Resurrection. Didn’t love, didn’t hate. I definitely liked it better after reading a few reviews to understand the references, but i was still bored most of the way. I dearly wish we’d followed the woman’s character, the actress was perfect and I so wanted to be mesmerised! But instead we went around a bunch of disconnected stories, and mostly filmed the (very well done) decors – I lacked human connection most of all! 6/10 imdb
The Brutalist. Part one is my favorite movie of the year in terms of plot. I loved seeing the emigration and arrival into this new American society. The second part was full misery porn and shock for shock value. Doesn’t help that I now severely dislike Adam Brody for his behavior. 3/10 (or 7/10 if you stop at the intermission) imdb
Conclave. My favorite movie of the year when it comes to pure visuals. Came out in 2024, but they always let us catch up on some stuff in January, so I took that opportunity and didn’t regret it! The scenography and the costumes were superb. A bit less convinced by the plot, especially the ending, which was a bit too out of left field to be believable, and didn’t really add anything but shock value to the themes. 8/10 imdb
Eagles of the Republic. This was excellent! It was ever so slightly redundant with the other movies in the Cairo trilogy, but it was still amazing. The writing, the humor when you don’t expect it, the beautiful filming, the great acting… No notes. (the pharmacy scene was my favorite) 9/10 imdb
Maria. The Maria Callas biopic! I think Angelina Jolie did a good job, but I hated the decision to make her sing. I get that La Callas lost her voice by the end, but it was atrocious to hear in the cinema. I liked the rest, I think, especially in how it was filmed. The soft colors and dreamy setting made it all real and not at the same time. 7/10 imdb
A Complete Unknown. Continuing on the biopic trend, here’s Bob Dylan! I liked it better in that it didn’t try to explain too much, and just showed what an asshole he was, while still being a brilliant artist. I can’t stand his voice though, and Chalamet (whom I can’t stand either anymore!) replicated a bit too well. 7/10 imdb
After all that, I didn’t see the Bruce Springsteen movie or the Queen one, because I was too saturated with biopics. I hope the trend dies off soon, so that we can go back to having original plots and characters.
Good Boy. I wrote a fuller review here, but the gist of it is that it was relatively well executed for its non-existent budget, and that I had a horrible time because I hate horror movies. It’ll teach me! Lots of good visual ideas to show a haunted house through the pov of a dog, and so I give it points for imagination! 6/10 imdb
French movies
I’ve been trying to go see more French movies in 2025, because we’re doing great things and I want to support that! So here are a bunch. I’ll try to add the English name if it’s out in the USA/UK so you can check them out.
Roughly from favorite to least:
La femme la plus riche du monde.(The Richest Woman in the World). A (dark) comedy, freely inspired from the Bettencourt scandal1. Deliciously scandalous, excellent performances, truculent dialogues,... There’s a little “eat the rich” edge to it that makes it satisfying. 9/10 imdb
Un ours dans le Jura. (How to make a killing). Wtf is that translated title? A Bear in the Jura mountains is so much better and much more evocative of the plot: after a fatal car crash, Christmas tree farmers Michel and Cathy find 2 millions euros and cover up the scene by pretending a bear ate the victims. Police investigation and cash laundering ensue. Another excellent dark comedy!2 9/10 imdb
L’inconnu de la grande arche. (The Great Arch) Funny that the english title removed the “unknown man” part of the title! This is an historical movie about the conception and buidling of the great arch of La Défense, the big modern (for the 80s) business center right outside of Paris, by a random Danish architecture professor. It was a very nice story, with just enough drama and good acting! You can see the lack of budget a bit – those dudes have 1 (one) jacket each lol, but it didn’t impede my enjoyment. Much better than The Brutalist imo3. 8/10 imdb
Vie Privée. (A private life). Jodie Foster, in a French role! And a good one, that was a lot of fun to watch. She’s a psychiatrist who investigates the death of one of her patients, whom she becomes convinced was murdered. Half murder mystery, half comedy, half family drama, … The pacing was good, I liked the muted colors in the film, and the plot was just drunk enough for me to forget about real life! 7/10 imdb
Chien 51. (Dog 51). Our big expensive action movie of the year! We the French have been so bad at finding money for those, so this makes me hopeful we’ll manage to make more in the future. This specific one is forgettable, with a basic rogue AI plot. But the matte painting on the backgrounds made for a believable half-destroyed Paris, so I’ll forgive it. You don’t necessarily need to get out of your way to see though, it’s very beauf as we say. 5.5/10 imdb
Les enfants vont bien. (Out of Love). You might know (and love) Camille Cottin from Call my agent,4 and she doesn’t disappoint here. It’s a pure French movie about family ties, with a lot of blank stares that mean everything and whispered dialogues, but I like the genre. Her sister disappears (voluntarily) and leaves her 2 children to take care of. The children were good, which is rare enough to mention, and the whole thing was emotional, even if I found it tried a bit too much to make us cry. 6.5/10 imdb
Dossier 137. (Case 137) Léa Drucker has to be one of my favorite living French actresses, but this movie was disappointing. It follows her as an officer in the “police of the police”, investigating alleged police brutality incidents during the yellow jacket protests. Sadly the director chose to stay “neutral” and gave no nuance or depth to any of the characters: Léa is bland, the policemen are brutes, the victim’s family members are poor, kind, sad people… Nothing new under the sun; could have been a documentary – but that’s not what I expect from a fiction movie. 6.5/10 imdb
Animal Totem. (I don’t think that came out anywhere but in France). WTF was that? Not in a Bugonia kind of way, just in a weird French movie kind of way? I think I liked it, but i’m not sure yet. There’s a business dude, with a suitcase handcuffed to the hand, going on foot from the Roissy airport to the La Défense business district. On foot. And he sees animals? This was an ecological fable (idk how to translate that, maybe tale?), and about capitalism too. 6.5/10 imdb
La condition. (untranslated too) A period movie about violent husbands, patriarchy, and sorority. Nowhere as good as Portrait of a Lady on Fire, but Swann Arnaud was a convincing villain, and the friendship between the woman and the maid was kind. I wish we’d actually explored the theme of keeping up appearances more: the maid is pregnant because she was raped by the husband, and they make a deal to keep it as the couple’s child, so that the rich woman can be more integrated into society. 6/10 imdb
Kaamelott 2 part 1. This one is personal: if you’re not French, you probably don’t know the untranslatable tv series of the same name: a reinvention of the Arturian legend, except they’re all dumbasses and Arthur can’t deal with it. Originally amazing short jokes (3 minutes long), then developed into an actual story (with 30 min long episodes of unequal quality), it’s now coming to the cinema.
The first movie was mediocre, but it had been so long we wanted to see what was next (can you see the parallels with anyone else?). Except movie 2 part 15 is even worse. The director plots (weirdly), writes dialogues (badly) and develops characters (unnaturally), and the audience is bored as fuck of seeing the same story over and over again. Contrarily to Avatar, I’ll still go see the next movie just in case. 1/10 (it’s not as upsetting as Avatar 3, but close!) imdb
Final words
So here was my retrospective of movies! Once again, please tell me below which ones I need to catch up on. I’m already booked for The Secret Agent in January!
If you want to see my opinion of big budget entertainment as well as animated movies, i wrote about that in part one.
And if you’re more interested in books, I also put together a reading wrap up:
Now I’ll take a break from posting over the holidays (unless I spend all my time putting together a big rant about Avatar 3, you never know), so I wish you and your families a good time, and I’ll see you next year <3
Thanks for sticking with me in 2025!
Love,
in which the richest woman in the world, literally, gave away a ton of money to her gay “friend” photographer, until her daughter files a complaint for abuse of the elderly.
Is it a sign of the times that my 2 favorites are dark comedies?
sure they weren’t trying to do the same thing, but there’s like a bunch of similarities, and i liked L’inconnu best.
I could write a full post on how the English translation is Call my agent ie the agent as someone who helps and does stuff, while the original French title is Dix Pourcents (10%), as in the amount of money the agent takes from your paychecks.
wtf is that title breakdown thing? we don’t need to import all of Hollywood’s shitty ideas, now, do we?