The Long Night

Jun 28, 2011 — Raymond Queneau’s Zazie dans le métro is the funniest book ever written in, and about, the French language. When it came out in 1959, it “made the whole of France laugh,” Jean-Paul Rappeneau, who helped Louis Malle adapt it to...

Jun 22, 2010 — In the autumn of 1989, the Iranian magazine Sorush printed a story about an unusual crime: a poor man had been arrested for impersonating a celebrated film director, Mohsen Makhmalbaf, to a middle-class family in northern Tehran. Although the accused,...

Jul 21, 2008 — Carl Theodor Dreyer’s elliptical and dreamlike vampire film defies definitive shots at interpretation.

Aug 1, 2007 — Two towering figures of cinema died this week, and while we can all be grateful that they lived such long and fruitful lives, their departures were nevertheless profoundly saddening, and shocking in their coincidence. Look to your right at our...

Oct 16, 2025 — This month, join us for a Thanksgiving feast of some of the movies’ most memorable family reunions, or delve into the dark alleyways of noir mysteries built around protagonists tormented by amnesia, memory holes, and drunken blackouts.

Jan 3, 2025 — We spent the holidays reading about Claude Sautet, Pascal Plante, and Christian Marclay.

Sep 30, 2024 — Showered with accolades, loved, admired, and feared, Smith was one of the most accomplished stars of the stage and screen.

Mar 28, 2022 — Despite wins to celebrate, the Oscars got off on the wrong foot—and then took a turn for the worse.

May 19, 2021 — The actor, writer, and talk show regular will be remembered as an “uncommonly intense and all-around uncommon performer.”

Aug 28, 2020 — This week’s highlights feature paintings brought to life, pioneering citizen journalists, early “race films,” and the first Japanese wave.