Best of the Best

Aug 20, 2024 — Delon brought to the films of Melville, Visconti, Deray, and Losey one of the most beautiful faces in all of cinema.

Jan 3, 2024 — The new year will bring us new work from Leos Carax, Bong Joon Ho, Francis Ford Coppola, Mike Leigh, David Cronenberg, Celine Song . . .

Jan 10, 2023 — In its ambivalence toward its provocative themes, John M. Stahl’s groundbreaking exploration of racial identity demonstrates the insolubility of Hollywood’s representational conundrum.

Aug 5, 2022 — We wrap the week with melodrama and Odorama, a new magazine, and the summer of 1982.

Feb 13, 2018 — With the scrappiest of means, George A. Romero created not only a landmark of independent cinema but also an indelible portrait of America as hellscape.

Oct 4, 2011 — No film better illustrates Pier Paolo Pasolini’s challenge to conventional representations, to the social and cultural consensus, than his 1976 masterwork.

Aug 9, 2011 — Gillo Pontecorvo’s incendiary epic commemorates the popular uprising that had succeeded in ousting the French from Algeria in July 1962.

Feb 2, 2004 — A story about defeat and failure, Robert Bresson’s masterpiece is a milestone in the slow process of the liberation of postwar French cinema

May 15, 2000 — Twenty-five years after its first appearance, Bergman’s film of The Magic Flute remains the finest screen version of an opera ever produced. Shot in sumptuous color by Sven Nykvist, and featuring some of the finest Nordic singers of the day,...

Sep 25, 2026 — David Lynch keeps reentering the conversation, and so does Pauline Kael. Plus: A roundup of recent newsletters.