The Stranger

Jan 9, 2026 — This week: Conversations with Lav Diaz, Mira Nair, and Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.

Dec 17, 2025 — Spike Lee captures the democratic spirit and the galvanizing, near-spiritual feeling of togetherness at the heart of David Byrne’s acclaimed stage production.

Sep 25, 2025 — To celebrate Robert Altman’s centennial, we invited five writers—Howard Hampton, Bruce LaBruce, Violet Lucca, Christina Newland, and Carlos Valladares—to each explore a favorite lesser-known gem from the great director’s filmography.

Sep 24, 2025 — Jacques Audiard’s Paris-set drama about small-time hoodlum with musical ambitions crystallized his identity as an artist with a high degree of confidence and control.

Sep 26, 2024 — Steeped in Catholic guilt and erotic tension, Guiraudie’s eighth feature draws comparisons with Pasolini’s Teorema.

Jun 28, 2024 — Alain Guiraudie and Angela Schanelec discuss their new films, Albert Serra opens an exhibition, and Paul Schrader gets ranked.

Sep 15, 2023 — This week features interviews with Martin Scorsese and Arturo Ripstein and appreciations of Tout va bien and Boris Karloff.

Sep 12, 2023 — Cord Jefferson’s American Fiction and Kristoffer Borgli’s Dream Scenario are received in Toronto with applause, laughter, and a few reservations.

Mar 8, 2022 — A parable of wayward women in a world without mothers, Márta Mészáros’s 1975 feature catapulted the Hungarian auteur to international prominence.

Jan 10, 2020 — How many times, in cultural history, has surrealism been declared out for the count? For the German philosopher Walter Benjamin, writing in 1929, surveying the surrealist literature of André Breton, Robert Desnos, and Louis Aragon, the glory days of this...