From the Heart

Feb 16, 2016 — In Death by Hanging, Nagisa Oshima spins a complex aesthetic web around his documentary-like structure, packing detail, history, politics, and emotion into his surrealist inquiry into capital punishment.

Oct 15, 2015 — Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni are cast against type—and funnyman director Ettore Scola gets serious—in this humane drama set in Fascist Italy.

May 22, 2015 — It is one of my most strongly held critical beliefs that you should not write about films you don’t like. First, it is bad for the soul to exult in pointing out the deficiencies of the film in question. Second,...

Apr 24, 2015 — Atypical in style and subject, Yasujiro Ozu’s early crime dramas show a future master brilliantly experimenting with camera and editing.

Feb 24, 2015 — Federico Fellini’s fragmentary and picturesque tale of death and debauchery in ancient Rome is a surreal take on reality.

Feb 20, 2015 — In time for this year’s Academy Awards ceremony, we wanted to celebrate all the incredible women who have been nominated for best actress Oscars for their roles in Criterion titles. They range from the 1930s to the 2010s, and include...

Feb 11, 2015 — With its provocative ambiguities, tender compassion, and fragmented editing style, this supernatural classic is a pure dose of Nicolas Roeg.

Nov 25, 2014 — More than just observational, Les Blank’s sensual documentaries are personal and participatory celebrations of American culture.

Oct 30, 2014 — Tati’s witty visual comedy also functioned as satire of a rapidly modernizing postwar France.

Oct 21, 2014 — There were plenty of advantages to living in Paris in the early 1970s, especially if one was a movie buff with time on one’s hands. The Parisian film world is relatively small, and simply being on the fringes of it...