The first week of January means the beginning of awards season. For the next three months, red carpets will be abuzz with interviews and paparazzi cameras. On Sunday, the 31st Critics Choice Awards kicked off one of the most exciting pop culture periods of the year.
The Critics Choice Awards are presented by the Critics Choice Association, an organization made up of entertainment critics. The awards celebrate accomplishments made in both film and television, and this year, the competition within both categories was steep. While the recipients were predictable, they were well deserving.
Film
2025 was a fantastic year for film. “Sinners” and “One Battle After Another” were the two most nominated films, with 17 and 14 nominations respectively. They are also the most-discussed for the coveted award of Best Picture across all award shows. In this case, “One Battle After Another” took the prize as well as a Best Director nod to Paul Thomas Anderson.
Despite falling short for the category’s biggest prizes, “Sinners” tied with “Frankenstein” for the most awarded film of the night, taking home four awards, including Best Original Screenplay. I am excited to see how the battle between “Sinners” and “One Battle After Another” continues to play out throughout awards season.
Personally, I am vying for “Sinners,” but both films are extremely deserving.
The next biggest awards in the film category are Best Actor and Actress. This year they went to Timothee Chalamet and Jessie Buckley. After seeing Buckley’s performance in “Hamnet,” I vowed that one way or another, I would make sure she got that Oscar.
Her portrayal of Agnes was incredibly moving and unlike anything else I had seen in cinema this year. Hopefully, her winning the Critics Choice Award is a positive indication that an Oscar is in the near future.
Chalamet’s victory is more nuanced. There’s no denying that his performance in “Marty Supreme” is a departure from his previous roles. Unlike Chalamet’s trademark emotional and sentimental demeanor, his role in “Marty Supreme” is brash, aggressive and completely unlikable. However, is it the best of his roles? No. Was it the best performance of those nominated? Also no. As a huge fan of Chalamet, I am happy he won. However, in the context of Best Actor, I would have opted for Michael B. Jordan. Jordan needed to portray two twins, yet opposites, and captured the emotional intensity of the experience of Black men in 1930s Mississippi flawlessly.
Another difficult category was Best Supporting Actor. The award went to Jacob Elordi, who had a humanizing and heart-wrenching portrayal of the Creature in Guillermo del Toro’s “Frankenstein.” Yet, Sean Penn’s performance as Colonel Lockjaw in “One Battle After Another” was explosive. Both actors gave strong performances that made them almost unrecognizable. While closely comparable, to me, Penn’s was the standout.
Television
The most nominated television show was Netflix’s “Adolescence,” a show that debates the future of a teenage boy after he is accused of murdering a female classmate. Of its six nominations, “Adolescence” claimed four awards, including Best Limited Series, Best Actor in a Limited Series or Movie Made for Television and both Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie Made for Television.
On the comedic side, Jean Smart won Best Actress in a Comedy Series for the second consecutive year for “Hacks,” and Apple TV’s “The Studio,” one of my favorite shows of 2025, took home three awards. The show’s Ike Barinholtz received recognition for his role as Sal Saperstein, who can also be thanked for the show winning Best Actor in a Comedy Series and Best Comedy Series.
Overall, the Critics Choice Awards had no major surprises. There were a few awards that could be contested, but solely because of the overall high quality of films and television shows across the board. There were no undeserving winners. But there is the question of whether who deserved to win actually won.
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