Life at the Top

Sep 13, 2007 — Some people have seen an impossible number of movies, and the most astonishing part is that they actually remember them all. Pierre Rissient, who is very much on our minds these days, is one of those. Producer, director, distributor, talent...

Jan 15, 2021 — This week we’re reading Greg Tate on MLK/FBI, Ian Christie on the decadence of early British cinema, and Reverse Shot’s 2020 top ten.

Jan 27, 2026 — Unencumbered by the white gaze, Reginald Hudlin’s groundbreaking feature-film debut is a celebration of a Black community in all its diversity, featuring fully realized characters who exist not as spectacle but as reality.

Jan 28, 2015 — Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan has directed fourteen features, including The Adjuster (1991), Exotica (1994), The Sweet Hereafter (1997), Ararat (2002), and, most recently, The Captive (2014). He writes, “Rather than a top ten, these are ten films with which I...

Jul 3, 2013 — PerformancesIn Rosemary’s Baby, one of the first exclamations that Minnie Castevet (Ruth Gordon) makes on hearing the news that her young neighbor Rosemary (Mia Farrow) is expecting a little bundle of joy is “I can’t wait to tell Laura-Louise!” Earlier,...

Oct 15, 2050 — Voice-over narration has existed since the beginnings of cinema and has been an integral part of some of the great masterworks of narrative film, from The Magnificent Ambersons to Double Indemnity to Jules and Jim to Taxi Driver. It spans...

Aug 20, 2001 — Before Lars von Trier, Krzysztof Kieslowski, Andrei Tarkovsky, Ingmar Bergman, Robert Bresson there was Carl Th. Dreyer. The first great film artist to pursue the ineffable in cinema, Dreyer gave depth to what early silent filmmakers innately understood yet took...

Feb 3, 2025 — The vibe in Park City was unsettling, but critics and juries discovered plenty of films to fall for.

Nov 5, 2024 — As a composer, arranger, producer, and perhaps above all, connector, Jones was one of the most vital artists of the past seventy years.

Jul 19, 2024 — We’re looking back to films by Pakula and Oshima, and from the 1990s, by Claire Denis and Richard Shepard.