Down By Law

Sep 11, 2025 — For J. Hoberman, the film “more than makes the case for Fonda’s centrality in the American imaginary.”

Oct 24, 2024 — The director of such classic political docudramas as On the Bowery and Come Back, Africa defied the conventions of nonfiction filmmaking with his innovative approach to collaboration and performance.

Aug 19, 2024 — Two Lithuanian directors score top awards, while Invention emerges as a critical favorite.

Sep 6, 2023 — Poor Things and The Beast are critical favorites, Ferrari comes alive when the big race is on, and verdicts are split on The Killer.

Jul 28, 2023 — This week: Stephanie Zacharek’s hundred favorites, Peter Wollen on the British New Wave, and a conversation with Hong Sangsoo.

Jan 13, 2022 — Yes, he opened doors, but he also brought a singular presence to American cinema.

Oct 20, 2020 — At the start of The Gunfighter, Jimmy Ringo is a man with eleven kills to his name, soon to be twelve. But the only place he actually appears to be very violent, or even very vital, is in other people’s...

Jan 16, 2020 — Deep Dives The question that was asked of the great actors and actresses of silent film with the coming of sound was simple: Could they speak? Could they adapt the styles they had developed to the demands of dialogue and...

Dec 17, 2018 — Secrets from the past are always surfacing in melodramas, altering or illuminating the landscape of the present. So it seems fitting that director John M. Stahl, one of Hollywood’s great masters of melodrama, had a past that is only now...

Feb 18, 2014 — The immediacy of an ongoing war electrifies Alfred Hitchcock’s suspenseful second Hollywood feature.