The Unknown

Jan 14, 2008 — As Japan was coming out of World War II, Akira Kurosawa was coming into his own as a filmmaker.

Dec 4, 2006 — William Greaves’s masterpiece uses a single situation as the basis for a theme-and-variation structure that interrogates every aspect of the filmmaking process as well as the categories of fiction and documentary.

Jan 10, 2005 — Seijun Suzuki's penultimate film for Nikkatsu is a subversively funny account of the making of a model fascist.

Jan 26, 2021 — I stumbled onto Will Niava’s debut short film, Zoo, via a still I saw online: a close-up of a young man’s face under blue neon, framed by cigarette smoke. Curious about this striking image, I tracked down the film and...

Oct 2, 2018 — Performances There’s an irreducible reserve about Kristen Stewart, an appearance of not doing much on-screen, that I mistook for lack of talent when I first saw her mumbling into her shirt in the Twilight franchise. Still, playing Bella Swan, chastity...

Aug 26, 2016 — 1. Director Tony Richardson selected Rita Tushingham for the lead role of Jo after auditioning two thousand young women. A Taste of Honey marked Tushingham’s screen debut, and while her performance went on to win the best actress award at Cannes in...

Aug 23, 2016 — Tony Richardson’s era-defining exploration of sexuality, race, and working-class life brought a uniquely female perspective to England’s Free Cinema movement.

Dec 2, 2015 — This fall the British Film Institute inaugurated a season-long celebration of on-screen romance with LOVE, its UK-wide series of theatrical screenings and rereleases of classic film love stories—from Badlands to A Room with a View. In conjunction with this month's...

Feb 20, 2015 — In time for this year’s Academy Awards ceremony, we wanted to celebrate all the incredible women who have been nominated for best actress Oscars for their roles in Criterion titles. They range from the 1930s to the 2010s, and include...

Nov 25, 2014 — Features Director Michelangelo Antonioni made these famous remarks at the press conference following the May 1960 Cannes Film Festival premiere of L’avventura. They appear here in a translation published in the spring 1962 issue of the journal Film Culture. Today...