My newfound appreciation for film happened over two long haul flights. That may sound paradoxical, given airline movies suffer from low resolution screens, compressed audio, engine noise, and turbulence. But sixteen hours in economy somehow gave me a new perspective on what makes movies great.
Only with air travel can I glance at and compare multiple films in progress on other passenger screens. A cursory scan across the cabin would usually reveal at least six different movies side by side. Stripped to their essentials, films become mini highlight reels. Some command your attention, while others disappear from memory immediately.
Even the compromises of glancing at your seat mates’ films become more a forcing function than a practical limitation. A lack of sound focuses my attention to the film’s visuals: camera blocking, actors’ expressions, color palettes, and bodies in motion stand out. Because any scene could be playing, narrative takes a back seat to vibes and immediacy.
The Korean director Hong Sang-soo is one of the most idiosyncratic auteur directors working today. He crafts minimalist dramas — conversations in bars, static camera shots — that are deceptively complex. Most of his films juggle multiple storylines, often featuring sly commentary on male-female dynamics and artistic pursuits. Though his films are often critically acclaimed and play at major film festivals, Hong remains under the radar of many cineastes.
Hong’s working style is one of a kind. Productions typically begin with just a few pages of script outline. The director writes each day’s scenes early in the morning. Actors memorize their dialogue on the spot and jump into shooting minutes afterward. A sparse crew and focused schedule ensure a typical Hong production wraps in just a few weeks.
Even with such spontaneous filmmaking techniques, Hong’s movies are more notable for their low-key consistency than variation. Character arcs are gentle. Emotions often stay beneath the surface. The setting is almost always present day Korea, usually the urban landscapes of streets, cafes, and bars. Most scenes are extended conversations, shot with long takes from a single master shot that avoids movement except for the occasional pan or zoom. Interactions tend to involve just two or three people, though typically at least one scene involves a larger ensemble eating and drinking soju together. Many Hong characters have connections to film, often working as directors or actors.
Early this year I wrote about macroeconomic pressures freezing the console and PC gaming markets in place. It’s only gotten more challenging in the months since.
Thanks to tariffs and an AI boom that has increased demand for RAM and other hardware, a PS5 Digital now costs $600 USD, while an Xbox Series X costs $650. Closed ecosystems ensure expenses beyond the hardware aren’t getting any cheaper either. It costs at least $80 to $100 for a year of multiplayer access. Full price AAA games are considering $80 price tags.
Circana research from Mat Piscatella underlines how console gaming is increasingly a hobby for the rich. Back in Q1 2022, 40% of households that purchased new video game hardware made more than $100k, while 31% earned less than $50k. By Q4 2025, 53% made more than $100k annually, while just 19% made less than $50k.
Yet Microsoft and Sony are making a bad situation even worse. Both corporations seem to have no plan for the future beyond catering to an increasingly high income enthusiast base.
How noticeable are the sound and video improvements of Blu-rays over their purely digital counterparts on streaming services and video on demand? Stress the word ‘noticeable’. While discs have an unquestionable theoretical advantage over anything Netflix, Apple, or Amazon offers — vastly higher bitrate, no dependencies on inconsistent internet signals, lossless audio — who can actually notice the difference? Under what conditions, and with what kind of equipment?
I set up an extensive head to head test to find the answer. I took a range of Blu-rays from my collection and put them up against the same movie available on streaming or digital VOD. I ran separate tests for audio and video, toggling between the same sequences from both sources. After hours of analysis alongside spot checks on many additional films over the last few months, I have some conclusions:
Upgrading from HD to 4K high dynamic range (HDR) video — either on digital or with a 4K Blu-ray — will be the single most impactful improvement for most movie watchers.
The overall improvements of disc over digital formats is usually more noticeable with sound than visuals.
The perceived gap in sound quality between disc and digital is highly situational. The more dynamic and complex the sound, especially in scenes that rely on surround audio channels, the more obvious the benefit of a disc’s lossless audio.
The newest and highest bit rate digital formats — 4K Dolby Vision for video, Dolby Atmos for audio — close the gap between digital and disc to the point where most casual viewers won’t notice the difference.
Those outcomes, in turn, lead to several recommendations:
If you like film, you’d probably benefit from rewatching movies more often. The act can help us refine our tastes, and educate us on a film’s construction, making us more astute film watchers. It’s also a dependably fun way to spend a few hours, especially for movies you love.
Rewatches matter because we can never experience the same movie in the same way twice. Our memories of our first watch always recontextualize the next. They free our brain up to refocus on other aspects of a movie. Often that allows us to pay less attention to the plot (we remember the story beats and ending), and more on the acting and technical underpinnings.
To put it another way, the rewatch, boosted by our memories, gives us a more comprehensive, expansive view on a film. We get to digest more aspects of the movie we may have missed the first time. And as we repeat this behavior over multiple movies, it’s easier to draw connections and patterns in the kind of movies we are drawn to.
Every awards season, I’m reminded there is an endless discussion of the great films, but not nearly enough of the merely good ones.
Scan any trade publication or film-adjacent social media in the period from December to February, and you’re bound to keep reading the same narrow list of ten to twenty films receiving all the attention. From critics groups to awards bodies and best of the year lists, it can feel like the same playlist on shuffle.
Few may interest mainstream audiences. A lot of good movies will. And a subset of those good films — films I’m calling Good to Great films, can contain the kind of “special sauce” that can convert a casual film fan into an enthusiast. For even the most hard core cineastes, they can broaden tastes and give us more to watch. Champion, recommend, and otherwise suggest Good to Great films, and we all benefit.
Good to Great films are generally regarded as fair to good quality overall. Few champion it, even fewer trash it. Yet the Good to Great movie distinguishes itself from the merely average by having at least one outstanding creative element. It might be an acting performance, or another contribution like cinematography, editing, score, or costume design. It’s the kind of trait that in isolation could be awards worthy and among the best of its class for the year, and can make the film irresistible to the right audience.
Sirat is one of the most unique experimental films I’ve seen in years. Writer director Oliver Laxe grafts an art house movie onto a Mad Max inspired action thriller, and the results are simultaneously thrilling and harrowing. While my other favorites from 2025 stand out for their engrossing plot or vibrant character arcs, Sirat is all about vibes: rattling techno sub-bass that put in me a trance, stunning shots of vans blasting across the desert, and explosive, emotionally shocking twists.
(Major spoilers ahead. Sirat just premiered in limited release, with a wider rollout in later February. For those intrigued by the premise, I’d recommend watching the film before reading more.)
With the console and gaming PC market at a standstill, gaming is facing one of its largest crises in a decade. Momentum the medium took for granted — new console generations, affordable hardware upgrades, and a growing player base — has hit a wall. The ripple effects could be devastating, leading to more layoffs and shuttered studios.
But before we can look ahead, we need to understand how we got here. Gradual shifts in demand over the last decade set the stage, and economic supply shocks locked them in place.
The first signs of a major shakeup appeared around 2018 with Fortnite’s massive success. The free to play “game as a service” (GAAS) drew massive player growth and revenues that rapidly outpaced full priced games from similar genres. Other GAAS like Roblox and Minecraft followed similar trajectories around the same period.
My favorite films of 2025 featured a wider range of genres, budgets, and themes than in the past. From heart-wrenching dramas to maximalist action, and tiny Sundance debuts to $100 million studio blockbusters, all ten films give me hope for the industry’s future. While it’s an especially challenging time for filmmakers, theaters, and financiers, great art continues to flourish.
To avoid genre bias, my list is in alphabetical order and limited to theatrical or streaming releases from this year. There are also several buzzy films I wasn’t able to see before locking in my selections, including Urchin, Pillion, and Resurrection.
It’s exciting to see that most of my favorite games of the year came from smaller studios willing to take big risks with story and gameplay. They offer an essential counterbalance to tired franchises that rely on micro transactions and familiarity to stay relevant.
Yet as great as it was to play such creatively daring output, it was an especially tough year for the industry. Widespread layoffs, corporate consolidation, and rising costs from tariffs and AI have many questioning gaming’s sustainability heading into 2026. And as bleak the state of gaming was, the world beyond it often felt worse. Amidst an otherwise gloomy news year, I take comfort in several great selections that should stand the test of time.