The Five

Dec 19, 2023 — Year’s end brings new translations of Serge Daney and Jean Cocteau and new books on Francis Ford Coppola and Jia Zhangke.

Oct 17, 2023 — I. “Morbid Cinema” On October 10, 1962, there appeared a brief paragraph from the Associated Press: “Tod Browning, eighty-two, who directed scores of movies between 1917 and 1939, is dead. He succumbed Saturday after an illness, and no funeral plans...

Jan 10, 2023 — In its ambivalence toward its provocative themes, John M. Stahl’s groundbreaking exploration of racial identity demonstrates the insolubility of Hollywood’s representational conundrum.

Feb 11, 2022 — The director discusses the making of his 1979 cult road movie, Radio On, which is now streaming exclusively on the Criterion Channel, and the influence of New German Cinema on his visual style.

Aug 30, 2021 — An electrifying voice in American independent cinema, the filmmaker, artist, and DJ Ephraim Asili believes that moving images can revolutionize our perception of the world. His body of work attests to this conviction. Since he began making films more than...

Jun 25, 2021 — This week’s highlights include a new issue of Cinema Year Zero, a dossier from Sky Hopinka, and an excellent new name for a subgenre.

Jun 11, 2021 — “The whole world is dying of panicky fright.” The opening on-screen text of Todd Haynes’s Poison promises an unsettled experience. Yet these words also might as well be predicting the puritanical response to the film that erupted from conservative quarters. After winning...

Apr 20, 2021 — Starring Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard and featuring a soundtrack by Sparks, Annette will premiere in competition.

Nov 30, 2020 — Cuban cinema has no present-day champion more devoted than Luciano Castillo. As the director of the Cinemateca de Cuba, an organization formed in 1960 by the Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industria Cinematográficos (ICAIC) in order to protect and promote...

Aug 14, 2020 — Appreciations of Kathleen Collins and Vittorio De Sica and interviews with James Mangold, Orson Welles, and Billy Wilder are among this week’s highlights.