The Criterion Collection
Essays
Nov 22, 2011 — 12 Angry Men (1957), the first feature film directed by the legendary Sidney Lumet, is a Hollywood classic that, ironically, helped to define an era of filmmaking grounded in the gritty realism and frenetic energy of urban New York. A...
Jun 19, 2006 — Decades after its backyard birth, Jack Woods’s DIY horror movie has forged a model of inspiration for succeeding generations of effects artists and low-budget filmmakers.
Sep 10, 2024 — Andrew Haigh explores loss and queer loneliness in this exquisite, twilit tangle of lives and loves separated by space, time, and personal defenses.
The Daily
Apr 15, 2022 — This week we’re reading interviews with Mira Nair and Jane Schoenbrun, profiles of Viola Davis and Maggie Cheung, and an essay on Joan Micklin Silver.
Feb 8, 2022 — A Prohibition-era gangster saga, the Coen brothers’ third feature is an enigmatic fable of violence, loyalty, and existential unease.
Feb 22, 2021 — Labor films are not where one typically goes when seeking love and grace. They are more often concerned with bodies subjected to torsion and the furrowed brow of someone who knows the cupboards are growing bare. Then there are the...
Oct 13, 2016 — From its diffusely structured narrative to its innovative cinematography, this radical western is a showcase for Robert Altman’s iconoclastic style.
Features
Aug 14, 2016 — While considered to lie outside the highly policed boundaries of film noir, films like Douglas Sirk’s Written on the Wind and Powell and Pressburger’s The Red Shoes nevertheless share many of noir’s stylistic and thematic tropes.
Oct 29, 2025 — In her intensely personal debut feature, the filmmaker and poet investigates the myths that have shaped South African history through a mix of archival footage, poetic remembrances, and conversations with friends and family.
The Daily
Sep 8, 2025 — Father Mother Sister Brother and The Voice of Hind Rajab win top awards in Venice.