When I think of 2025, I can’t help but think of how it started, with the loss of a titan and a personal hero of mine, David Lynch. In my confused and frightened teenage years, I caught a late-night showing of Blue Velvet on television and I remember what it taught me: that, yes, the world is a very cruel place. There is an evil that breeds in its soil and bubbles up to the surface in new, awful ways every single day. But there is also love. And love can sometimes be found in the movies. They can promise you that tomorrow will be better. And you can believe it.
I can’t help, then, but also think of how the year has ended, with an endless news ticker of corporate monopolies, mass layoffs, and advancing AI, and how the entire industry behind the films we love, the little beacons of light, feels so at risk. But still, despite the obstacles, 2025 has provided me (and I hope you) with so many of those little beacons of light. We should treasure them.
