Feast on more award-worthy, gripping films with these upcoming releases
Our columnist writes that 2025's film releases will be hard to beat. Some titles to look forward to are “Wicked: For Good” and “Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere.” Emma Lee | Contributing Illustrator
Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our newsletter here.
2025 has been a refreshing change of pace in a decade oversaturated with money-grabbing blockbuster slop.
This year presented a diverse selection for all film goers, from award-worthy creative masterpieces like “Sinners” to “One Battle After Another,” to exciting blockbusters like “Superman” and “F1.”
There’s a movie for any type of audience, casual viewer or cinephile. As it stands, 2025 has been more than satisfactory, but there are still a plethora of films yet to come that will build on what this year has produced. Let’s look at what the remainder of the year has in store.
A remake of the 1987 cult classic based on the book by legendary author Stephen King, “The Running Man” holds a lot of potential for its release on Nov. 14. Led by enigmatic director Edgar Wright, who is famous for brilliant films such as the Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy, “Baby Driver” and “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World,” Wright intends to blend his unique filmmaking approach with this bizarre story to create something exciting for all audiences.
The movie stars Glen Powell as Ben Richards, who joins the top-rated game show “The Running Man” to save his sick daughter. Thirty contestants must survive for 30 days, while the public, who have the luxury of seeing the contestants’ every move, try to track them down and kill them. The prize increases each day the participant survives, but so does the risk. Based on trailers, Wright and Powell look like a match made in heaven, channeling each other’s charisma to help create one of the most entertaining pictures of the year.
Joe Zhao | Senior Staff Photographer
What would 2025 be if it didn’t include the prince of Hollywood himself, Timothée Chalamet? It’s looking like the year of the Safdie brothers, except this time their films are separate rather than together. A couple weeks ago, Benny Safdie released his new movie “The Smashing Machine” starring Dwayne Johnson.
Come Christmas, Josh Safdie plans to debut his own solo project, the story of phenom pingpong player Marty Reisman. All signs are pointing to this movie being excellent.
Between its interesting story, A24’s involvement and movie Midas Timothée Chalamet, “Marty Supreme” is looking like it’s going to be one of the best movies in a loaded 2025. Maybe this will be the year that Timmy finally takes home the gold trophy, but we’ll just have to wait and see.
“Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery”
Rian Johnson and Daniel Craig return with another “Knives Out” mystery that might be the best of the series to date, based on recent reviews. “Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery” follows the franchise’s main character, Benoit Blanc, while traveling to investigate the murder of priest Monsignor Jefferson Wicks’ congregation.
If “Wake Up Dead Man” lives up to the hype, there’s no telling how fantastic this film could be, especially following the success of its predecessors. Make sure to check this out when it comes out on Netflix on Dec. 12.
Honorable Mentions
I could’ve put so many films on this list, but these three are definitely the movies I’m looking forward to the most as the year comes to an end.
Another movie to look out for is “Wicked: For Good,” set to release on Nov. 21. The sequel to 2024’s “Wicked” covers the same cast of characters following Elphaba’s demonization as the newly crowned Wicked Witch of the West, as well as the journey of Glinda, Fiyero and other main characters.
Finally, I’m very excited about the Bruce Springsteen biopic “Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere” coming out on Oct. 24. Starring Jeremy Allen White, the movie should add to the historic run music biopics have been on this century, and we could see the young superstar get his Academy Award nomination.
Movie fans have had a spoil of riches this past year, but 2025 isn’t over yet and there are a lot of great things to come. Make sure you see one of these films before the year is over — who knows if the rest of the decade will be as incredible as this year was.
