First Love

Apr 20, 2015 — "Afilm about India without elephants and tiger hunts”—this was how Jean Renoir described his objective in making The River. Guided by Rumer Godden’s autobiographical novel, he rejected the India of exotic action and spectacle to make a meditative, almost mystical...

Apr 14, 2015 — Before he turned Vienna into a labyrinth of shadows with The Third Man, Carol Reed brought film noir to Belfast for this stylishly fatalistic tale of a man caught up in political violence.

Mar 25, 2015 — Long unheralded and at last rediscovered, actor-director Robert Montgomery’s Ride the Pink Horse is one of the key Hollywood features of 1947, the year film noir flooded the screen like a ruptured reservoir of India ink. Adapted from the popular...

Feb 24, 2015 — Federico Fellini’s fragmentary and picturesque tale of death and debauchery in ancient Rome is a surreal take on reality.

Feb 23, 2015 — We love talking to Mexican horror auteur Guillermo del Toro (Cronos) about movies; he’s among the most knowledgeable, passionate, and articulate cinephiles we know. We were particularly intrigued to hear his take on Martin Rosen’s 1978 animated film Watership Down,...

Feb 20, 2015 — In time for this year’s Academy Awards ceremony, we wanted to celebrate all the incredible women who have been nominated for best actress Oscars for their roles in Criterion titles. They range from the 1930s to the 2010s, and include...

Feb 17, 2015 — It was never, of course, Yasujiro Ozu’s intention that An Autumn Afternoon (1962) should be the final film of his thirty-­five­-year career as a writer­-director. Indeed, before he died on his sixtieth birthday, in December 1963, he had made notes...

Feb 11, 2015 — With its provocative ambiguities, tender compassion, and fragmented editing style, this supernatural classic is a pure dose of Nicolas Roeg.

Feb 10, 2015 — The late film scholar beautifully analyzes the visual lyricism of the French master’s legendary short work.

Feb 3, 2015 — Jean-Luc Godard returned to the character-driven intensity of his earlier films with this satirical but serious-minded take on men, women, and money.