The Big Chill

Jan 18, 2019 — Award-winning cinematographer John Bailey discusses the complications that Alfred Hitchcock faced trying to execute one of the most ambitious shots in his filmography.

Jul 19, 2021 — When Dennis Lehane joked in 2011 that the only real difference between Greek tragedy and noir was that in the former characters fall from great heights and in the latter they drop from the curb, he was pinpointing something simultaneously...

Mar 7, 2017 — With his unique blend of British realism and romantic fatalism, director Andrew Haigh exposes the quiet desperation at the heart of a long marriage.

Sep 29, 2014 — The great cinematographer Freddie Francis’s brilliant work on Jack Clayton’s chilling 1961 horror movie The Innocents is widely admired by movie lovers and professionals. For an appreciation of this film’s incredible visuals, we turned to cinematographer John Bailey (The Big...

May 19, 2026 — “My history’s burning up out here,” Ned Racine (William Hurt) tells his lover in the opening minutes of Lawrence Kasdan’s directorial debut, Body Heat (1981). Ned, a small-time attorney and local roué in his South Florida beach town, recognizes the...

Oct 29, 2019 — Matewan opens in the pitch-black darkness of a West Virginia coal mine. A miner lights the carbide lamp on his helmet. The small open flame he wears provides the only flicker of light in this cramped space next to a...

Nov 26, 2018 — The Magnificent Ambersons “Plus one and minus one equal nothing. So you mean I’m nothing in particular?” —Isabel “Remember you very well indeed.” —George “George, you never saw me before in your life!” —Eugene What is this cult I signed up...

Dec 7, 2021 — Regina King’s feature-film directorial debut envisions the true-life convergence of four prominent Black figures with empathy and moral urgency.

Sep 10, 2013 — Martin Ritt’s 1965 movie of John le Carré’s first great novel (and first best seller), The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, declares “a plague on all your houses” to capitalists, Communists, and ruthless intelligence operatives. It’s one espionage...

Sep 7, 2018 — F ew filmographies encapsulate the rebellious spirit of American cinema in the seventies better than that of Hal Ashby, who crafted an astonishing string of movies that stretched across the span of the decade. Finding success as an editor early...