MICHAEL Review

Michael Jackson is a complicated subject for me. Not because of why you might expect, though. Like most who have consumed any (pop) culture over the past fifty years, The Jackson 5, The Jacksons, and Michael Jackson especially have been not just a part of my life, but a large, even life-altering part. I am the oldest of five children, ten years between my youngest brother and myself with only one sister separating two sets of boys. From the time the youngest was in diapers my three brothers and I performed together. Because we were a group of singing and dancing brothers, we inevitably incorporated those record-setting first four singles from The Jackson 5 into our act. In fact, through to our final performance together in 2014, we would often end our sets with the "I Want You Back/ABC/The Love You Save" medley from the "Triumph" tour recording. This naturally branched into learning/incorporating post-Motown Jacksons records into our shows and, of course, countless solo offerings from Michael. Whether it was our "Michael" doing the whole of the "Billie Jean" routine, performing "Thriller" at every show in October, or perfecting the "Dangerous" routine from the 1995 MTV Video Music Awards for my senior year talent show, the amount of artistry this single human being encompassed was not lost on me. As I matured, I was confronted with the allegations leveled against Jackson and though I don't overlook or discount this aspect of the individual Michael Jackson was they are very much not a part of the story this film is telling. That said, the point of any music biopic is to investigate the artist further, attempting to make sense of the why and how they produced the art they did, but maybe this is precisely why Antoine Fuqua's Michael is more a concert than it is a contemplative or thoughtful piece of introspection. 

Michael Jackson was an enigma by intention (“I wanna be mysterious.”) yet this film does nothing (new) to uncover either what made him the way he was or why he chose to be that way. The movie is most brave when it dares to confront fans with the obvious that was never spoken of (the nose jobs, the physical fallout from the Pepsi commercial) and is at its best when Jaafar Jackson and Juliano Krue Valdi are performing from what is irrefutably one of the best catalogues in all of music, but even if the film only zeroed in on the how/why such a meek man like Michael made such aggressive and often times angry music, why his social to stage persona shifted so drastically, the result would be ten times more enlightening than the carousel of greatest hits we've both heard (re: his discography) or seen (re: The Jacksons: An American Dream) before. What makes Michael worth the time and effort though is that Michael Jackson is the template for how to perfectly balance quality and commerciality to the point even in its most shallow of re-creations the music and visuals never ring hollow.

Movies I Wanna See Most: 2026

I haven't really put together a proper "Most Anticipated" list in several years, but this year it has served as something of a much needed reprieve from everything else going on in life. Typically, I would feel rushed to post something like this immediately after the new year, but being able to comb through the 2026 calendar, discover projects I had no idea about prior, and contemplate what many of these titles might turn out like has made me really hopeful about what I can look forward to at the theater this year. Sure, movie-going is in a bigger state of flux than it's ever been in my lifetime and as much as the future of not just cinema but moreso - the cinemas - is unknown, it feels deeply difficult not to celebrate movies in the moment and be excited about where the trends and turns of the industry might take us next. 

That all to say, it was quite difficult whiddling this list down to only ten titles given some of the huge releases slated for this year. The hardest cut was undoubtedly Avengers: Doomsday given I'm naturally excited to see what that film turns out to be, but after seven years of what has become an on/off and at times oversaturated relationship with the MCU, there is more anxiety around the latest Marvel Studios release than there is necessarily excitement. Other tough cuts include new films from Gore Verbinski, Andrew Stanton, Phil Lord and Chris Miller, Robert Eggers, Sam Raimi, Emerald Fennell, Ruben Östlund, David Lowery, Ridley Scott, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Boots Riley, Nicolas Winding Refn, Olivia Wilde, Zach Cregger, and Greta Gerwig. That's a wide range of types of filmmakers, many who are attempting something different than what they've done in the past - whether that be in genre, budget, or adaptation - but the truth of the matter is that each of their styles and/or past films have given whatever they touch going forward an immediate air of intrigue.

TOP 10 OF 2025

After 2023, I wasn't sure what the future of my role in "film criticism" would look like or if it would look like anything at all. After the dissolution of my YouTube channel that year and trying to find my footing so far as how often I would go long in writing about films here it all felt a little forced. So, I let what happen happen organically and it has become that of trying to designate at least one film a month that I plan on writing more in depth about. Sometimes nothing sparks the need one month, other times there are multiple films in the same month and many times it simply comes down to not having enough time to go long on every film I'd like to. Would I have liked to write a full review for Sinners? Of course. Did I ever get around to it? No. The further I got from my viewing experience with no chance of a second screening in sight the less I felt like I could do the film justice. I still log everything on Letterboxd which tells me I have seen 217 films this year with my count for films actually released in 2025 likely being about half that which would be down from the 172 I saw last year. Given my wife and I welcomed our fourth child back in January I knew my weekly theater visits wouldn't necessarily be "weekly" and that our home viewing time might either be severely impacted or see an increase. Turns out all I wanted to do while the baby slept on me was watch comfort movies and documentaries, so that didn't help much when it came to catching up on the early theatrical releases I missed during their initial runs. That said, I still saw about fifty movies in theaters this year, caught up with plenty on streaming and via screeners as well as all the original Netflix, Prime, and Hulu films that went straight to those services. Not my best showing, but I still believe I saw enough to make an informed decision when it comes to what are some of the best and, of course, what are my favorites of the year. I expect 2026 will look very similar to this year but also know it could look very different given the direction one or two things decide to go in life. That is for the future to decide though, for now...here are my ten favorite films of 2025:

SEFCA ANNOUNCES 2025 WINNERS

Southeastern Film Critics Association Names ‘One Battle After Another’ as the Best Film of 2025

Writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson’s topical comedy-drama also takes home awards for Adapted Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor

Monday, December 15, 2025 – The Southeastern Film Critics Association (SEFCA) has named Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another as the Best Picture of the Year. SEFCA’s 99 members, located across nine Southeastern states, also recognized Anderson for Best Adapted Screenplay and Benicio del Toro as Best Supporting Actor.  

The other big winner was Sinners, which won Ryan Coogler the Best Director award and Michael B. Jordan Best Actor.  Its large cast also received the award for Best Ensemble.

Jesse Buckley was named Best Actress for her work in Chloe Zhao’s Hamnet while Amy Madigan triumphed as Best Supporting Actress for Zach Cregger’s  Atlanta-filmed Weapons.

Many races were decided by only a few votes, most notably Best Foreign Language Film, where Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just an Accident narrowly beat Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value.

“It’s been an exceptional year for film, both blockbusters and smaller independent works,” says Jim Farmer, Vice President of SEFCA. “As film critics throughout the South, it’s our honor to recognize the best of a truly memorable season.”

“It was really satisfying to see a genre film like Sinners performing so well with critics across the country while also being a sensation at the box office,” says Scott Phillips, President of SEFCA. “I’ve always been a big supporter of horror films, and three of our Top 10 films fall into that genre.”

The Southeastern Film Critics Association is one of the oldest regional film critics associations in the country. Its mission is to represent – as an impartial, organized working unit – the profession of film criticism, to recognize the highest creative achievements in the field of motion pictures and uphold the integrity and significance of film criticism.

SEFCA’s full list of 2025 are winners below. Visit SEFCA on the web at SEFCA.net to learn more about its members as well as past winners. You can also follow SEFCA on Twitter at @SEFilmCritics.

WAKE UP DEAD MAN Review

It was only a matter of time before Rian Johnson used the church and religion as a means for one of his Knives Out vehicles and as someone who can both very much relate to Mr. Benoit Blanc's position in this film (love the hair btw) while keeping my balances in check enough to understand and more critically - empathize with - Josh O'Connor's Father Jud, Wake Up Dead Man is everything one might hope for from Johnson's exploration of faith while not necessarily meeting the expectations he has set for us with his first two whodunits (albeit by a very small margin). As a result, Kniv3s Out feels like an expertly concocted film where the genre serves the themes but the subject matter doesn't always allow the murder mystery aspects to excel; serving them well but not necessarily surpassing what Johnson has done in the past even as one can feel the writer/director pushing himself, invoking the classics in hopes they lead him to fresh deviations on these types of stories.  

Johnson eloquently crafts what feels like his own, ongoing internal monologue that goes back and forth between the need to logically solve the existence of God or if feeling the essence in one’s soul of what God’s teachings strive to convey is the real point. How Johnson graphs this onto this radical priest (closing out a banner year for Josh Brolin) and his small but loyal congregation who each personify a type of internet personality doesn't make it instantly feel as if something's not clicking but the turning of the knife (pun intended) becomes more apparent when our "suspects" are brought to the forefront. Kerry Washington is the networker, Daryl McCormack is the influencer, Andrew Scott the conspiracy theorist, Jeremy Renner embodies the lurker – watching but rarely interacting, and then there is Cailee Spaeny who barely registers but implies to be that specific kind of social media user who posts solely for the likes, comments, and validation these signs of approval bring with them. Glenn Close gaslights the hell out of people to the point I’d hate to see what she might do on message boards while Thomas Haden Church portrays her husband, an example of toxic codependency at its best – they’re sharing one Facebook account for sure. Close nearly breaks from these molds, her Martha Delacroix carrying forth the sole purpose of keeping the corrupting evil out of wicked hands. Much like profiles on a webpage though, these individuals are easily dismissed – working more for Johnson’s objectives than developing individual personalities.