The Criterion Collection
Essays
Oct 15, 2001 — The music in Benjamin Christensen’s classic constantly refers to something deeper, creating a sort of deep pity in preparation for the ending of the film.
Essays
Aug 20, 2001 — Carl Dreyer considers the work of art’s soul in this excerpt from Dreyer in Double Reflection.
Essays
Jul 9, 2001 — John Schlesinger’s beloved dramedy subverts the conventions of British kitchen-sink realism.
Essays
Jun 18, 2001 — Pent-up, unfulfilled sexuality spills onto the screen in Douglas Sirk’s sumptuous melodrama.
Essays
Apr 23, 2001 — Released in late 1938, Alexander Nevsky was not only the first sound film to be directed by Sergei Eisenstein, but the director’s political comeback as well. This most famous of Soviet artists had not completed a movie since The Old...
May 15, 2000 — Herk Harvey described to me a strange outdoor ballroom he had seen rotting on the shores of the Great Salt Lake. . . and said he’d like to make a film about creatures rising from the lake and doing a...
Essays
Apr 24, 2000 — “Most of Aesop’s fables have many different levels and meanings. There are those who make myths of them by choosing some feature that fits in well with the fable. But for most of the fables this is only the first...
Essays
Nov 23, 1999 — The occasion of the 100th anniversary of Alfred Hitchcock’s birth rewards us with a new release of one of his greatest films, The 39 Steps (1935). This DVD provides a newly restored transfer, new critical audio commentary on the film,...
Essays
Feb 1, 1999 — Rob Reiner’s directorial debut documents a recent moment in the band’s checkered history—one that only coincidentally represents a brief decline in the sine wave of their careers.