20 Most Overlooked Movies Of 2025

Despite being the latest film from venerated British auteur Mike Leigh and benefitting from rightful Oscar buzz for Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Hard Truths barely made a dent when it released at the start of the year, resulting in one of the softest box office runs of Leigh's entire career.

While Leigh's kitchen sink drama about a depressed, standoffish middle-aged woman (Jean-Baptiste) was never going to be a commercial juggernaut, it did little business at all outside of the filmmaker's most die-hard supporters, no matter that it's another fantastically evocative work from him.

Jean-Baptiste is flawless here as protagonist Pansy, and while it isn't easy to spend even just 97 minutes with such a combative character - which may be part of the film's appeal problem - the result is a character study that feels astoundingly down-to-Earth.

Hard Truths doesn't have the broad appeal of Leigh's more popular works, but it is nevertheless an expertly crafted low-fi drama and among the very finest British films released this past year.