The Thing

Coming of age isn’t easy—especially in the Criterion catalog.

Jan 21, 2008 — Lindsay Anderson’s adaptation of David Storey’s novel is a clenched fist of a movie that follows a professional Rugby League player who instinctively channels feeling through physical aggression.

Jul 24, 2006 — Powell and Pressberger’s poignant work captures the fulfillment and absolute sameness of the everyday and the sacred.

May 9, 2005 — This seminal documentary conveys the particular seductiveness and resonance of the dream of going pro for two talented Chicago teenagers.

May 26, 2003 — Embracing the world while pretending to sneer at it, Henri-Georges Clouzot’s crime film is rich, deep, and wily.

Jul 9, 2001 — John Schlesinger’s beloved dramedy subverts the conventions of British kitchen-sink realism.

Nov 8, 1999 — The virgin of Orleans and those matters that surrounded her death began to interest me when the shepherd girl’s canonization in 1920* once again drew the attention of the public-at-large to the events and actions involving her—and not only in...

Aug 28, 1995 — Three Cases of Murder is of most interest to American audiences for Orson Welles’s flamboyant and bravura performance as Lord Mountdrago. However, it’s equally important as a showcase for Wendy Toye, one of Britain’s first female directors, and star Alan...

Oct 19, 2023 — Her entrance in the film is impossible to forget. She swings into the scene to serve a patron some coffee, holding a cup in one hand and a book in the other. Her diamond-shaped face is obscured, but her aura...

Apr 25, 2023 — In his second Palme d’Or–winning film, Ruben Östlund uses familiar reality-television tropes to stage a deeply unnerving spectacle of obscene wealth and class outrage.