Now that Paramount+ has started rolling out its new June 2025 titles, it’s the ideal time to start curating your watchlist for the next few weeks. If you’re struggling to decide what you should be prioritizing among the 80 new movies, allow me to point you to these five Oscar-winners.
Each one has been recognized by the movie industry’s most prestigious awards institution, whether that’s for writing, acting or artistic achievements. They include a psychological drama that’s one of my favorite movies of all time, an artsy yet heart-breaking coming-of-age story, and a Best Picture-winning historical biopic.
Whiplash (2014)
RT score: 94%
Age rating: R
Runtime: 106 minutes
Director: Damien Chazelle
Arriving on: June 1
What is there to say about Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash that I haven’t already got off my chest? Well, not only does it sit high as one of my top four movies in Letterboxd, but J.K. Simmons’ unsettling performance as a demanding music instructor earned him the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
A commentary about ambition and obsession, Whiplash is a psychological drama set in an elite New York City music school, where aspiring drummer Andrew (Miles Teller) dreams of making it big like his idol Buddy Rich.
He gets one step closer to his dream when the conductor of the conservatory’s band Terence Fletcher (Simmons) invites him to play in the ensemble, but Fletcher’s unconventional and abusive teaching methods push him to his limits, and ultimately test his sanity.
12 Years a Slave (2013)
RT score: 95%
Age rating: R
Runtime: 134 minutes
Director: Steve McQueen
Arriving on: June 1
As far as biopics go, 12 Years a Slave is about as hard-hitting as they get. No emotions are left unaffected, leaving me in tears. It deservedly scooped three Oscars: Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actress for Lupita Nyong’o, and Best Picture.
Adapted from Solomon Northup’s 1853 memoir, the film powerfully and vividly relates the hardship and abuse Northup, who’s superbly portrayed by Chiwetel Ejiofor, suffered after being kidnapped by two conmen and sold into slavery in Louisiana.
Over the course of 12 years, Northup is subjected to endless violent abuse, much of it at the hands of plantation owner Edwin Epps (Michael Fassbender), but an opportunity to regain his freedom presents itself when he meets a Canadian abolitionist.
Call Me By Your Name (2017)
RT score: 94%
Age rating: R
Runtime: 106 minutes
Director: Damien Chazelle
Arriving on: June 1
Guadagnino brings the pages of Andre Aciman’s novel of the same name to life in a coming-of-age drama that’s both visually stunning and thoroughly convincing in its portrayal of romantic bond, and anchored by a solid screenplay.
Call Me By Your Name was nominated for a total of four Oscars in 2018, earning the award for Best Adapted Screenplay. It gave Timothee Chalamet his breakout role as an actor, earning him his first Oscar nomination at the age of just 22.
By turns captivating and heart-shattering, the film is set in 1983 and follows 17-year-old Elio (Chalamet) on a summer vacation to his family’s Italian villa. There, the family is joined by Oliver (Armie Hammer), a 24-year-old student and intern for Elio’s father, and Elio and Oliver gradually fall for each other, but their relationship is destined to end in heartbreak.
Pulp Fiction (1994)
RT score: 92%
Age rating: R
Runtime: 154 minutes
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Arriving on: June 1
While I personally find Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs (1992), Kill Bill (2003), and Inglourious Basterds (2009) more entertaining, there’s no denying that his darkly comic crime thriller Pulp Fiction is one of his finest accomplishments.
As well as winning the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, Tarantino was awarded the Palme d’Or at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival, the festival’s highest award.
Set in the present day but adopting stylistic references from 1950s pop culture and crime novels, the film tells four interwoven stories featuring a mixed bag of characters including two hitmen, a gangster boss and his actress wife, a boxer, and a pair of nervous armed robbers.
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
RT score: 94%
Age rating: PG
Runtime: 115 minutes
Director: Steven Spielberg
Arriving on: June 1
Two of modern cinema’s creative titans, Steve Spielberg and George Lucas, joined forces to make the first film in what would become one of the most celebrated action-adventure franchises of all time. While it surprisingly didn’t score any major Oscars for direction, writing, acting, or John Williams’ iconic score, it did pick up five Academy awards, including Best Sound and Best Visual Effects.
Set in 1936, the film stars Harrison Ford in his first outing as swashbuckling archaeologist Indiana Jones, who’s hired by the US government to recover the Ark of the Covenant and prevent it falling into the hands of the Nazis, who believe it has the power to make an army invincible. ‘Indy’, with old flame Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) in tow, embarks on a race across Nepal, Egypt and the Aegean Sea to find the legendary artifact, desperately trying to stay one step ahead of the Nazis and rival archaeologist René Belloq (Paul Freeman).
