Scene These Reviews

Yellow graphic titled ‘Top 25 Films of 2025’ with black icons of an eye and a vintage film camera above the text. At the bottom center, a cutout photo of a man wearing glasses, a brown sweater, and a lanyard stands in front of a stylized movie theater icon

The Ultimate List: The Top 25 Films of 2025, Ranked

2025 brought many highs; I became a member of the Portland Critics Association, we launched Scene This, our weekly movie podcast that has survived its first year, I attended my first film festival (TIFF), and lastly, the year 2025 gifted me the most new releases films from any given year that I've ever seen. Of the 370 films I watched this year, 130 of them were released in 2025. For the top 25 of 2025, there is a mix of big studio films, independent films and a variety of un

Jan 113 min read

The Smashing Machine - Attempts To Be A Knockout Punch, But Lacks The Decisive Blow

The Smashing Machine attempts to deliver a hard-hitting portrait of Mark Kerr, the legendary mixed martial artist whose career was...

Oct 2, 20253 min read

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband): A Spiritual Battle To Reclaim Promised Love

Inuit filmmaker Zacharias Kunuk breathes life into Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband) , a spiritual love story that fuses history, culture,...

Sep 15, 20252 min read

Three people sit in a grassy field on a mountainside, with misty blue mountains in the background. One person in the foreground is out of focus, while a woman on the left and a bearded man on the right are in focus, both looking toward the camera with solemn expressions.

Bajo El Mismo Sol (Under The Same Sun): Subtle, Yet Palpable Tension Around Cultural Hybridity

Spanish filmmaker Ulises Porra’s latest film is a tense and moving exploration of colonialism in the early 19th-century Caribbean. At its...

Sep 12, 20252 min read

Two men stand on a boat in a tense moment from the film Little Lorraine. The man in the foreground wears a dark beanie and stares ahead with a serious expression, while the man behind him wears a yellow-and-white cap and smokes a cigarette. Text on the image reads “Little Lorraine: A Lifetime Melodrama Masquerading as a Thriller,” alongside TIFF and Scene This logos.

Little Lorraine: Lifetime Drama Masquerading as a Thriller

Little Lorraine sets up a promising premise: a coal miner whose opportunities have dried up reluctantly turns to his shady uncle’s...

Sep 5, 20252 min read

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