The Flu

Sep 15, 2009 — Words are the trained fleas in David Mamet’s sidewalk circus—dirty words, often bloodstained, usually swarming, that perform their acrobatic stunts for gawkers who will likely get their pockets picked. That’s the reputation, anyhow. More than thirty years after he made...

Sep 13, 2016 — Kenji Mizoguchi achieved the sublime with this structurally complex portrait of artistic ambition and female subjugation.

Dec 18, 2000 — Elegant humor cloaks despair in Luis Buñuel’s masterwork, wherein greedy characters flee their toxic lives and find refuge in the loneliness of dreams.

Jul 10, 2026 — We’re celebrating the Harry Dean Stanton centennial, listening to Ross McElwee and Tsai Ming-liang, and revisiting the work of Bruce Conner.

Dec 18, 2025 — At year’s end, we’re reading about the partnership and breakup of Alfred Hitchcock and composer Bernard Herrmann—and much more.

Apr 11, 2025 — We’re paging through the new Millennium Film Journal and reading elsewhere about William S. Burroughs, Pauline Kael, and John Ford.

Dec 21, 2022 — Many of the most notable films of the year tell deeply personal stories.

Sep 16, 2022 — It’s been a week overshadowed by loss, but here are a few of the brighter highlights.

Mar 23, 2021 — “Pleasure,” wrote Samuel Butler in The Way of All Flesh, “is a safer guide than either right or duty.” Surely this is true when it comes to watching films. While cinema can be edifying, most of us go to the...

Sep 17, 2019 — Also this month: Hollywood stars writing and reading and a novel that reimagines the intertwined lives of Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl.