Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another has been named the best film of 2025 by the Southeastern Film Critic’s Association (SEFCA).
“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.”
Anderson’s adaptation of the Thomas Pynchon novel Vineland also earned him the Best Adapted Screenplay award and a Best Supporting Actor honor for Benicio del Toro as a martial arts instructor who defends the undocumented community in San Diego. Sean Penn, who played a deranged military commander trying to earn membership in a secret white supremacist organization in One Battle After Another, was the runner up for Best Supporting Actor.
The voting in this year’s poll was extremely close, says Farmer. “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.“
One Battle After Another narrowly defeated Ryan Coogler’s Sinners for Best Picture, but Coogler won Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. Sinners star Michael B. Jordan won Best Actor for his dual role as the Smokestack Twins, a pair of brothers whose ambition to open the ultimate juke joint is disrupted by a clan of ancient vampires. Sinners also won Best Ensemble Cast and Best Score. As a measure of how close the voting was, One Battle After Another was the runner up in the Best Director, Best Ensemble, Best Cinematography, and Best Score categories.
“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.”
As one of the oldest film critic associations in the United States, SEFCA boasts more than 100 members, including the Memphis Flyer‘s Film/TV Editor Chris McCoy. The Flyer‘s picks for top films of 2025 will be published in our year-end issue on Dec. 24.
Here is the full listing of SEFCA awards honorees.
Top Ten Films of 2025:
2. Sinners
3. Marty Supreme
4. It Was Just an Accident
5. Sentimental Value
6. Hamnet
7. Train Dreams
8. Weapons
9. Frankenstein
10. The Secret Agent
Best Actor
Winner: Michael B. Jordan, Sinners
Runner-Up: Ethan Hawke, Blue Moon
Best Actress
Winner: Jessie Buckley, Hamnet
Runner-Up: Rose Byrne, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You
Best Supporting Actor:
Winner: Benicio del Toro, One Battle After Another
Runner-Up: Sean Penn, One Battle After Another
Best Supporting Actress:
Winner: Amy Madigan, Weapons
Runner-up: Teyana Taylor, One Battle After Another
Best Ensemble:
Winner: Sinners
Runner-Up: One Battle After Another
Best Director
Winner: Ryan Coogler, Sinners
Runner-Up: Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another
Best Original Screenplay
Winner: Ryan Coogler, Sinners
Runner-Up: Joaquim Trier and Eskil Vogt, Sentimental Value
Best Adapted Screenplay
Winner: Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another
Runner-Up: Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar, Train Dreams
Best Documentary
Winner: The Perfect Neighbor
Runner-Up: Predators
Best Animated Film
Winner: KPOp Demon Hunters
Runner-Up: Zootopia 2
Best Foreign Language Film
Winner:It Was Just an Accident
Runner-Up: Sentimental Value
Best Cinematography
Winner: Autumn Arkapaw (Sinners)
Runner-Up: Michael Bauman (One Battle After Another)
Best Score
Winner: Ludwig Goransson (Sinners)
Runner-Up: Jonny Greenwood (One Battle)