Song Sung Blue

Dec 4, 2019 — Songbook Midway through Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank (2009), the plot pivots on a song. “You’ve got some weird shit in here,” says Joanne (Kierston Wareing,), riffling through the CDs in her new boyfriend’s car. It’s the morning after a boozy...

Sep 11, 2017 — In this documentary portrait of the Newport Folk Festival, Murray Lerner captured seismic changes in American music and politics.

Dec 1, 2009 — The first words we hear are Sam Cutler’s: “Everybody seems to be ready—are we ready?” We were nowhere near ready for what was to come, there at the bitter end of the sixties. I remember that rainy day so well,...

May 22, 2006 — Barbara Kopple’s detailed analysis of a Kentucky mine workers’ strike is a virtual hub of urgent themes, formal tendencies, political debates, and material practices that define post-sixties documentary in America.

Dec 2, 2013 — With its dazzling array of characters, acerbic take on American entertainment and politics, and innovative approach to sound, this is the ultimate Robert Altman movie.

Feb 14, 2025 — The director of Down with Love talks about his favorite romantic comedies set in the great metropolis and looks back on the making of his own foray into the genre.

Jan 8, 2025 — We’re looking forward to new work from Richard Linklater, Bong Joon Ho, Kelly Reichardt, Christian Petzold, Chloé Zhao, Sebastián Lelio, and many other filmmakers.

Aug 17, 2022 — The music of the legendary, multiple-Oscar-winning composer brought the freedom and anxiety of postwar America to life.

Apr 21, 2021 — First Person The first time I saw Terence Davies’s 1992 film The Long Day Closes, I was upended by a recurring image of the sensitive Liverpool lad at its heart, his arms folded across a worn window ledge as he...

Oct 15, 2020 — Songbook According to Kraftwerk member Wolfgang Flür, it was toward the end of the group’s first U.S. tour when his bandmates Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider grew fascinated by the phenomenon of American radio. Their time in the States had...