“Anora” Ends Major Night with Best Picture Win at 2025 Oscars: ‘Long Live Independent Film’

The year’s Best Picture has been named at the 2025 Oscars!

Anora beat out nine other contenders for the Academy’s top prize this year: The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, Conclave, Dune: Part Two, Emilia Pérez, I’m Still Here, Nickel Boys, The Substance and Wicked. This was the film’s fifth award of the night, which also included Best Actress for leading lady Mikey Madison.

After taking the stage to accept the trophy from When Harry Met Sally costars Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal, film producer Alex Coco began by acknowledging the triumphant moment for the independent film.

“Thank you guys so much. Thank you to the Academy. We made this movie for $6 million, shooting on location in New York City with about 40 crew members. They’re all back in New York. This is for you guys. Thank you so much,” Coco said. “We made it to be independently. If you’re trying to make independent films, please keep doing it. We need more. This is proof.”

After giving thanks to loved ones and others involved in making the film a reality, fellow producer Samantha Quan took over from there, saying, “I don’t know how this can be real life.”

“This is really an incredible, impossible journey since for the past 10 months and honestly, I’d like to thank my mom, my dad and my sister, JoJo,” she said. “To our small but mighty crew and our ridiculously talented cast led by the amazing Mikey Madison. We made this with very little money, but all of our hearts. To all of the dreamers and the young filmmakers out there, tell the stories you wanna tell. Tell the stories that move you. I promise you you will never regret it.”

Wrapping things up, director and screenwriter Sean Baker, who was also acknowledged separately for his efforts earlier in the ceremony, said: “One last thing: I wanna thank the Academy for recognizing a truly independent film.”

“This film was made on the blood, sweat and tears of incredible indie artists,” he added. “Long they independent film.”

Anora stars Madison, 25, as a sex worker in New York City, experiencing a whirlwind Cinderella story. Madison previously won a BAFTA Award for her performance.

In addition to the film itself and Madison’s winning performance, the Academy recognized Yura Borisov with a nomination in the Best Supporting Actor category. Baker won for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. Anora also won best picture at the 2025 Critics Choice Awards last month.

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The Brutalist is led by Adrien Brody as a Hungarian-born Jewish architect who emigrates to the United States following the Holocaust.

The Brady Corbet-helmed period drama rolled into the Academy Awards ceremony with 10 nods, including for Brody, 51, and supporting stars Felicity Jones and Guy Pearce, as well as a Best Director nomination for Corbet, 36.

A Complete Unknown stars Timothée Chalamet as 1960s-era Bob Dylan. Oscar-nominated for Chalamet, 29, plus supporters Monica Barbaro and Edward Norton, the film is helmed by director and co-writer James Mangold, who was also up for Best Director.

Directed by Edward Berger, papal drama-thriller Conclave recently nabbed the best film prize at the 2025 BAFTA Awards.

The movie — which also generated Oscar nominations for Ralph Fiennes (Best Actor) and Isabella Rossellini (Best Supporting Actress) — imagines a series of twists in the modern-day Vatican City.

Aside from A Complete Unknown, Chalamet also led Dune: Part Two, Denis Villeneuve’s highly praised follow-up to his 2021 sci-fi epic Dune.

An adaptation of the Frank Herbert sci-fi classic, Dune: Part Two was also nominated at the Oscars for Best Cinematography, Best Production Design, Best Sound and Best Visual Effects.

Emilia Pérez follows a high-powered lawyer named Rita (Zoe Saldaña), who is hired by a Mexican cartel leader (Karla Sofia Gascón) to help them fake their death and undergo gender-affirming procedures so that they can transition into life as a woman.

The Jacques Audiard-directed Spanish-language musical, which won best motion picture: comedy or musical at the 2025 Golden Globe Awards, nabbed a total of 13 Oscar nominations — the most of any movie this year — including in the categories of Best Actress for Gascón, 52, Best Supporting Actress for Saldaña, 46, and Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay for Audiard, 72.

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The film has also been at the center of controversy surrounding resurfaced social media posts made by Gascón, who deactivated her X account on Jan. 31 after coming under fire for past inflammatory tweets which criticized Muslim culture, George Floyd and diversity at the Academy Awards.

She has made various statements to the media and on her Instagram account, including a Feb. 6 post where she apologized to “everyone who has been hurt along the way,” vowing to be silent and “let the work talk for itself.”

I’m Still Here finds Torres playing a mother and activist coping with the forced disappearance of her husband. It is based on Marcelo Rubens Paiva’s biographical book of the same name, and also received nominations for Best Picture and Best International Feature at the Oscars.

Torres, 59, previously won best dramatic movie actress at the Golden Globe Awards in January, and dedicated the honor to her fellow-actress mother Fernanda Montenegro, now 95, who “was here 25 years ago” nominated for her role in 1998’s Central Station, which also earned her an Oscar nod.

“And this is proof that art can endure through life, even in difficult moments,” Torres added of her win, saying that I’m Still Here is “a film that helped us to think how to survive in tough times.”

Nickel Boys, from director RaMell Ross, is a unique screen adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning historical novel based on real-life abusive reform schools in America.

Nominated both in the top category and for Best Adapted Screenplay, the movie stars Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson, Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor.

Coralie Fargeat’s body-horror satire flick The Substance stars Demi Moore as a fading actress who attempts to reverse her aging process, with Margaret Qualley as her alternate “self,” Sue.

Moore, 62, has swept awards season, including with wins at the Globes, Critics Choice Awards and, most recently, the SAG Awards. (She lost the BAFTA Award to Madison.)

Wicked was tied with The Brutalist for the second-most nominations this year at 10, including not only Best Picture but Best Actress for Cynthia Erivo and Best Supporting Actress for Ariana Grande.

The Jon M. Chu-directed musical film, based on the Broadway show of the same name, was also up for Best Original Score, Best Editing, Best Production Design, Best Costume Design, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Sound and Best Visual Effects.

Erivo, 38, and Grande, 31, even treated the audience and viewers at home to a rousing performance earlier in the evening.

Other performers at the star-studded ceremony, held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, included Queen Latifah, Doja Cat, Lisa of BLACKPINK and RAYE.

See PEOPLE’s full coverage of the 97th annual Academy Awards, which were hosted by Conan O’Brien and aired on ABC Sunday, March 2.