A Year of Essential Reading on the Current
From deeply researched surveys of great filmmakers’ careers to idiosyncratic takes on under-examined corners of cinema history, the writing we published this year offered an array of entry points into the art form we all love. Here’s a selection of some of our favorite articles to tide you over until we get back to posting in the new year!
JANUARY
Opening the Aperture: Women Cinematographers on Their Craft
By Bárbara Alvarez, Ashley Connor, Michelle Crenshaw, Ellen Kuras, and Iris Ng
Five acclaimed directors of photography open up about the pleasures and challenges of pushing the envelope in a changing industry.
FEBRUARY
This entry in our Songbook series explores how the ’20s jazz hit “I Can’t Give You Anything but Love, Baby” throws the screwball classic’s nonchalant attitude toward wealth into relief.
MARCH
Ghost Town: Nights on Bunker Hill
By Imogen Sara Smith
This Dark Passages column explores the shadows and seedy corners of a once-exclusive area of downtown Los Angeles featured in films like Kiss Me Deadly, Somewhere in the Night, and Act of Violence.
APRIL
Kazuo Hara’s Dedicated Lives
By Markus Nornes
In his uncompromising chronicles of modern Japanese society, the celebrated filmmaker shows a deep understanding of both larger-than-life individuals and collectives of ordinary citizens.
MAY
The Eyes That Fascinate
By Lucy Sante
Louis Feuillade’s binge-worthy serial Les Vampires reflects the French national subconscious in the early twentieth century by depicting a world of anarchy and violent spectacle.
JUNE
The Melancholic, Joyous Soul of Guru Dutt
By Mayukh Sen
The director-actor-producer has long been considered a tragic icon due to his early death. But there is more to his art than misery.
JULY
Cinema Pugilistica: A Century of Boxing on Film
By Christina Newland
Films like The Set-Up, Raging Bull, and The Harder They Fall use the microcosm of the ring to tackle political tensions and inequalities in American society.
AUGUST
The Mancini Touch
By Nate Chinen
The Oscar-winning composer brought the freedom and anxiety of postwar America to life in an eclectic array of Hollywood classics.
SEPTEMBER
James Wong Howe’s Way with Light
By Walter Chaw
Throughout his prolific career, the legendary cinematographer mixed technical ingenuity with the vulnerability and longing of an outsider.
OCTOBER
Playing the Vampire: Six Performances That Draw Blood
By Michael Atkinson, Angelica Jade Bastién, David Cairns, Phoebe Chen, Beatrice Loayza, and Geoffrey O’Brien
Six writers explore how the role of the vampire has given talented actors throughout film history—from Bela Lugosi to Catherine Deneuve—the chance to embody physical and moral extremity.
NOVEMBER
The Daughter of Dawn’s Vanished World
By Adam Piron
After glimpsing his great-great-grandfather on-screen, a writer searches for the history of a landmark silent film.
DECEMBER
Irene Goes Wild
By Benjamin Dreyer
The great but underrated Hollywood star Irene Dunne made her transition to screwball comedy by playing the scandal-courting author at the heart of Theodora Goes Wild.
More: Features
An Asian American Comedy Milestone Riffs on a Kung-Fu Icon
One of the first hit movies made by an Asian American team, They Call Me Bruce confronts everyday racism with irreverent humor emblematic of its era.
The Good Fight: Deepa Dhanraj’s Visions of Solidarity
Over the course of her four-decade career, the pioneering Indian documentary filmmaker has demonstrated the important roles that joy and pleasure play in the process of political change.
The Wet Dreams and Twisted Politics of Erotic Thrillers
Combining elements of soft-core porn and film noir, one of the most popular Hollywood genres of the 1980s and ’90s captured the fraught aspirationalism and sexual mores of the era.
How to Stay, When to Vanish
The author of the novel Fiona and Jane looks back on a relationship that never quite solidified—and a future that never quite arrived—through the prism of Bi Gan’s Long Day’s Journey into Night.