Opera

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,...

Mar 11, 1993 — Released the year before Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars, Nicolas Roeg’s terrestrial space opera is devoid of matte shots, models, or pyrotechnics, and it leaves us not wondering at the stars but grieving for ourselves.

May 25, 1992 — If Max Ophuls hadn’t cooled his heels in Hollywood to flee the Nazis, his name might have conjured only the most unintelligible of foreign cinema—vague and inaccessible to the average American filmgoer. But in 1948 Ophuls was given an opportunity...

Wayne Koestenbaum, a poet and cultural critic, has published sixteen books, whose subjects include opera, Jackie Onassis, Andy Warhol, hotels, humiliation, and Harpo Marx. His most recent book is My 1980s & Other Essays. He is a Distinguished Professor of...

John Rockwell was a longtime arts critic and editor for the New York Times and the founding director of the Lincoln Center Festival. The author of four books (one about Lars von Trier), he is now a freelance writer and...

Sep 17, 2007 — G. W. Pabst’s adaptation of the play by Bertolt Brecht transforms the original without betraying it, softening its cynicism with humanity and integrating elements of psychoanalysis.

Aug 21, 2026 — Touring David Lynch’s LA, listening to screenwriter Samy Burch, and deciphering Adam Curtis.

Aug 13, 2026 — BAM’s sun-drenched series features films by Ozu, Kurosawa, Oshima, Kitano, Obayashi, Shinji Somai, and more.

Aug 4, 2026 — New restorations, festival favorites, and world premieres are heading to Toronto.

May 28, 2026 — Film at Lincoln Center and Cinecittà present two series back to back, Open Roads: New Italian Cinema and History, Italian Style.