List of 2025 Oscar winners: “Anora” in the lead, horror films in difficulty again Cinemax

It’s happening again: The 2025 Oscars, the 97th Academy Awards, took place early in the morning at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles, California, after a difficult few months in Hollywood following massive fires that destroyed entire neighborhoods in the “City of Angels.” Although the headlines are talking about the massive success of the independent film “Anora,” which won five HUGH Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress in a Leading Role, we are gathered here to talk about another topic: the films and actors of our favorite genre, which, once again, have won almost no awards.

It’s not that there were too many expectations, even after the nominees were announced a few weeks ago. After all, there have been enough quality films outside of the horror genre this year, and the Academy, as we know, has a tendency to leave behind the films we love so much (sometimes rightly so, often not). There were some expectations for the excellent “The Substance”, notably Demi Moore. Yet in the end we only got one win for a horror film – but a very justified win – in the technical category.

Here’s everything you need to know about the exciting aspect of the 2025 Oscars: the scary.

The big winner of the 2025 Oscars: “Anora”

The best picture award went to “Anora,” Sean Baker’s independent comedy-drama about the relationship between a stripper (Mikey Madison) and the son of a Russian oligarch (Mark Eydelshteyn). It is difficult to say that this victory is surprising, because “Anora” has won the sympathy of critics and audiences and has already received several significant awards: the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the best film at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards, and much more. Although he did not receive an award at the Golden Globes, despite five nominations, he is the big winner at the Oscars with five awards out of six nominations.

“Anora” beat out nine other nominees, including the film “The Substance,” which is undoubtedly one of the strongest contenders for the unofficial title of best horror film of 2024. The man behind “Anora,” Sean Baker – who wrote, directed and edited the film – also won best director, best original screenplay (a category he also competed in with “The Substance”) and the award for best horror film. Film editing. Thanks to this, Baker won four Academy Awards and was the first to win all these awards in a single ceremony. It’s an insane feat for someone who has been working for more than two decades but who has until now been on the most extreme fringes of American cinema.



Amber From Scream wins Best Actress

From a horror fan’s perspective, the most open question is whether Demi Moore will score the first win of her career, in her first nomination, after winning Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical at the recent Golden Globes.

The problem is that Moore was up against great actors such as Fernanda Torres (“I’m Still Here”), Cynthia Erivo (“Wicked”), Karla Sofía Gascón (“Emilia Perez”) and, most notably, Mikey Madison, who also won the award for his captivating role in “Anora.” Madison does so at just 25 years old, making her the ninth youngest actress to receive this coveted award.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgFPKh5OWM8

Madison thanked the sex worker community in her speech and promised to stand with them in the future. Still, we remember her best as Amber Freeman in the fifth “Scream” film – and there will be some spoilers for the 2022 film here, so if you haven’t seen it yet, we recommend skipping to the next paragraphs. Anyway, in “Scream 5” (which is just called “Scream”, for some reason), Amber Freeman – played by Madison – is Tara’s (Jenna Ortega) best friend, but ultimately also one of the killers under the Ghostface costume.

From my recollection of discussions in various Facebook groups and articles on the subject, there is a lot of controversy surrounding his character. Many fans define Amber as one of the weakest “Ghostfaces” in the franchise – I’m not sure if the fault here is Madison’s, but more on the script level. On the other hand, in other ranking, it is placed in a good place in the middle or even at the first places in terms of levels of cruelty.

In any case, Mikey Madison is not the first actress from the “Scream” cast to be nominated, nor even the first Scream Villain. She was preceded by Laurie Metcalf, who played Debbie Salt in “Scream 2,” who was eventually revealed to be Billy Loomis’ mother and the one behind Ghostface in that film. Metcalf was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in Greta Gerwig’s 2017 film “Lady Bird,” but ultimately lost (deservedly) to Allison Janney for “I, Tonya.”

Of course, the Scream cast also includes an Academy Award winner: Anna Paquin, who won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress as a child — just 11 years old — for her role in “The Piano” (1993). We’ve seen her in the controversial opening of Scream 4, as one of the characters in “Stab 7”, in what becomes a film within a film, or other reflexive nonsense that has mostly annoyed most fans.

Mary McDonnell, who played Jill’s mother (Emma Roberts, who ultimately turns out to be *SPOILER* in the film) in “Scream 4,” was nominated for two Oscars, for “Dances with Wolves” and “Passion Fish.”

Horror films in technical categories: at least horror got an award

Let’s get back to the list of winners of the 97th Academy Awards, with a few horror films that managed to make the list of nominees. The only very justified victory of our favorite genre is that of best makeup and hairstyling. This award went to “The Substance” thanks to the incredible work on (mostly) Demi Moore’s character and the changes she goes through trying to create “the best version of herself.” “The substance“ beat another horror film (“Nosferatu”) and other high-quality films: “Wicked,» “Emilia Pérez,“ and “A different man,“ which some have defined as a sort of less terrifying version of “The Substance”.

In total, “The substance“ was nominated in five categories – Best Picture, Best Director (Coralie Fargeat), Best Actress (Demi Moore), Best Original Screenplay and Best Makeup and Hairstyling – and, as mentioned, only won one award.

“Nosferatu,“ nominated in four technical categories – Best Production Design, Best Cinematography, Best Makeup and Hairstyling and Best Costume Design – walked away without an award. So did it “Alien: Romulus,“ which lost in the Best Effects category to “Dune: Part 2”.

List of 2025 Oscar winners and nominations:

Here is the complete list of winners and candidates for the 2025 Oscars. The winning films are in bold and horror films are in red (simply because it’s a scary color).

Best picture

• “Anora”
• “The Brutalist“
• “A complete stranger“
• “Conclave“
• “Dune: part two“
• “Emilie Pérez“
• “I’m still here“
• “Nickel Boys“
• “The bottom”
• “Wicked”

Best Director

• Sean Baker, “Anora”
• Brady Corbet, “The Brutalist”
• James Mangold, “A Complete Unknown”
• Jacques Audiard, “Emilia Pérez”
• Coralie Fargeat, “The Substance”

Best Actor in a Leading Role

• Adrien Brody, “The Brutalist”
• Timothée Chalamet, “A complete stranger”
• Colman Domingo, “Sing, Sing”
• Ralph Fiennes, “Conclave”
• Sebastian Stan, “The Apprentice”

Best Actress in a Leading Role

• Mikey Madison, “Anora”
• Cynthia Erivo, “Mean”
• Karla Sofia Gascón, “Emilia Pérez”
• Demi Moore, “The Substance”
• Fernanda Torres, “I’m still here”

Best Supporting Actor

• Kieran Culkin, “A Real Pain”
• Youra Borissov, “Anora”
• Edward Norton, “A Complete Unknown”
• Guy Pearce, “The Brutalist”
• Jeremy Strong, “The Apprentice”

Best Supporting Actress

• Zoé Saldaña, “Emilia Pérez”
• Monica Barbaro, “A complete stranger”
• Ariana Grande, “bad”
• Felicity Jones, “The Brutalist”
• Isabelle Rossellini, “Conclave”

Best Original Screenplay

• “Anora”
• “The Brutalist“
• “A real pain »
• “September 5“
• “The bottom”

Best Adapted Screenplay

• “Conclave”
• “A complete stranger“
• “Sing Sing »
• “Emilie Pérez“
• “The nickel boys »

Best Cinematography

• “The Brutalist”
• “Dune: part two“
• “Emilie Pérez“
• “Married“
• “Nosferatu”

Best Film Editing

• “Anora”
• “The Brutalist”
• “Conclave”
• “Émilie Pérez”
• “Wicked”

Best production design

• “Wicked”
• “The Brutalist“
• “Conclave“
• “Dune: Part Two“
• “Nosferatu”

Best Costume Design

• “Wicked”
• “A complete stranger“
• “Conclave“
• “Gladiator II“
• “Nosferatu”

Best Makeup and Hairstyle

• “The bottom”
• “A different man“
• “Emilie Pérez“
• “Nosferatu”
• “Wicked”

Best Original Music

• “The Brutalist”
• “Conclave“
• “Emilia Pérez“
• “Wicked“
• “The wild robot

Best Original Song

• “Wicked”, “Emilia Pérez”
• “The journey,» “The Six Triple Eight“
• “Like a bird,» “Sing, sing“
• “In my way, “Emilia Pérez”
• “Never too late”, “Elton John: Never too late”

Best sound

• “Dune: Part Two”
• “A total unknown”
• “Émilie Pérez”
• “The Wild Robot”
• “Wicked”

Best visual effects

• “Dune: Part Two”
• “Alien: Romulus”
• “A Better Man”
• “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes”
• “Wicked”

Best Documentary Feature

• “No other land”
• “Black Box Logs”
• “Porcelain War”
• “Soundtrack to a Coup”
• “Sugar cane”

Best Documentary Short Film

• “The only girl in the orchestra”
• “Death in numbers”
• “I’m ready, Director”
• “Incident”
• “Instruments of a beating heart”

Best Live-Action Short Film

• “The silent echo”
• “Crossroads”
• “Echoes”
• “The Letter Room”
• “Flows”

Best Animated Short Film

• “In the shade of the cypress”
• “Beautiful men”
• “Magic Candy”
• “Walk towards wonder”
• “Yuck!”

Best Animated Feature Film

• “To flow”
• “Inside Out 2”
• “Memory of a Snail”
• “The Wild Robot”
• “Wallace & Gromit: Revenge of the Biggest Bird”

Best International Feature Film

• “I’m still here” (Brazil)
• “Emilia Pérez” (France)
• “Flow” (Latvia)
• “The Needle Girl” (Denmark)
• “The seed of the sacred fig” (Germany)