The latest Oscar shortlist will put your home cinema setup through its paces with the best cinema of the year. As the 2025 Best Picture race hots up ahead of tomorrow's reveal, let's explore some of the other categories to find some of the gems that'll bring you thrilling visuals and sound combining to give you an Oscar-worthy night in.
The 97th Academy Awards take place on Sunday 2nd March at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles. In the US it'll be shown on ABC and streamed live (for the first time ever), on Hulu. ITV will broadcast proceedings live in the UK. As for the movies themselves, several of the big contenders are still playing in cinemas: head to your local theatre and get comfortable for the epic The Brutalist, nominated 10 times, or Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, nominated 8 times.
Of the contenders that are available to watch at home, Netflix is home to the divisively loopy musical Emilia Pérez, which earned a whopping 13 nominations. Your TV will lavish you with the sumptuous cinematography of Maria on Netflix, and splatter every gory drop of The Substance on Mubi (potentially the first Best Picture nominee to use 21,000 litres of fake blood).
Here's how you can watch the 2025 Best Picture contenders at home, or read on for other categorie nominees that'll put your home cinema through its paces.
Better Man
Best Visual Effects nominee
Whether you've already rushed to the cinema to see Better Man depends entirely on your feelings about pop princeling Robbie Williams. But even if you were never much of a Take That fan, Better Man is worth a watch and is available to rent at home now. It fizzes with an energy that conventional music biopics can't match, thanks to the bold choice of portraying Williams as a CGI monkey. That's why it's nominated for Best Visual Effects, delivering a perfect home cinema combination: massive pop bangers working out your woofers, plus your big screen showcasing one of the most gobsmacking visual effects achievements of recent years.
If you're ambivalent about Williams himself, watch a YouTube video about how they did the VFX (above). When I learned about the cleverness of the effects, it made me truly appreciate moments like the bit where the CGI monkey shaves his CGI head, or the bravura one-take shot of fake Take That bouncing down Regent Street on pogo sticks, seamlessly changing outfits as they go.
Sure, if you want to see unbelievably life-like CGI simians made by the VFX maestros at Weta, you could watch Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, also nominated for this year's visual effects Oscar. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't have any pogo sticks. Come on – let the monkey entertain you.
The Wild Robot
Best Animated Feature, Best Original Score and Best Sound nominee
Bambi meets Wall-E. That's the pitch for The Wild Robot, a heartwarming animated tale of a malfunctioning android crash landing on a forest planet, where it has to muddle through motherhood after accidentally taking charge of a baby goose. Even if you don't have kids you can still appreciate The Wild Robot’s gorgeous animation, not to mention sound and score that have earned the film two more Oscar nominations.
In a year where many of the nominated documentaries and films are extremely tough to watch, the cartoons in the Best Animated Film category might seem like a bit of light relief – but don't be fooled. The Wild Robot, Flow and Pixar's Inside Out 2 are a mix of adorable characters and full-blown emotional torture. If you don't cry at these cartoons, you're probably a robot yourself.
I'm Not a Robot
Best Live Action Short Film nominee
Speaking of robots: check out this 22-minute short film on YouTube (above). Written and directed by Victoria Warmerdam, it tells the unsettlingly relatable story of a young woman who fails one of those annoying online CAPTCHA tests and is plunged into a disturbing new reality. One for fans of Black Mirror, and a great way to get into the world of short films. When you've breezed through this quick watch, be sure to check out Anuja on Netflix, and seek out the wonderful nominees in the Best Animated Short Film category.
See you on the red carpet!
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