The Criterion Collection
Feb 21, 2006 — Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) is an Ealing comedy in name only. True, it’s undeniably a comedy and was made by (though largely not at) Ealing. But in virtually every other respect, it deviates startlingly from the commonly accepted stereotype....
Essays
Feb 14, 2005 — A touchstone of Jean-Luc Godard‘s political period, the film plays with the idea of recording working-class history as it is happening.
Essays
Jun 21, 2004 — Nouvelle vague euphoria was at its height when Jean-Luc Godard made his enormously clever third feature.
Essays
Feb 23, 2004 — Laurence Olivier’s last entry in his trilogy of Shakespeare films is the crowning glory of the British studio system and the end of the great cycle of British films aimed at international audiences.
Sep 29, 2003 — In May 1981, in the midst of shooting Lola, Rainer Werner Fassbinder sketched out his next film project: Sybille Schmitz. On the cover, he had written, “Story for a Feature Film*.” The asterisk pointed to this footnote: “It is possible...
May 26, 2003 — Transcription of a speech given by long-time Derek Jarman collaborator and friend, actress Tilda Swinton
Essays
Apr 28, 2003 — Federico Fellini both identifies with and satirizes the provinciality that forms his romantic comedy's central subject.
Jan 6, 2003 — Ernst Lubitsch set the screwball comedy standard, treating hard-on material with dignified aplomb and a combination of suaveness, hilarity, and sexiness.
Nov 11, 2002 — A second Monterey International Pop Festival has for the past month been put in jeopardy by a vicious handful of citizens, cops, and city officials in a small-town drama straight from Peyton Place and The Invaders.
Essays
Jul 9, 2001 — John Schlesinger’s beloved dramedy subverts the conventions of British kitchen-sink realism.