Before the Fall

Jun 21, 2024 — An underrated figure of Japanese cinema’s postwar era, the director tackled a wide range of subjects over his long career, including corporate double-dealing, government espionage, and various forms of fanaticism.

May 14, 2024 — Despite the harsh critical drubbing it received upon its release in 1960, Michael Powell’s lurid tale of obsession and violence is now widely regarded as a masterpiece—and as a key inspiration for an entire subgenre of “slasher” movies.

Mar 11, 2024 — After scoring eight nominations over more than twenty years, Christopher Nolan is finally taking home a couple of Oscars.

Jan 31, 2024 — MoMA presents a series of musicals, comedies, and melodramas injected with Buñuel’s singular surrealist vision.

Jan 16, 2024 — Drawing on the influence of a wide range of genres, John Sayles creates a densely layered narrative that unfolds across two timelines and explores the long-hidden secrets of a small border town in Texas.

Jan 12, 2024 — This week’s given us essays on Chantal Akerman and Edward Yang and conversations with Takeshi Kitano and Robert Bresson.

Nov 20, 2023 — This month brings new books on Godard and Bergman, novelists moonlighting as film critics, and biographies of Lena Horne and Elizabeth Taylor.

Oct 25, 2023 — What, awards season already? All of Us Strangers leads with four, followed by Past Lives and A Thousand and One, with three each.

Sep 25, 2023 — There was a period under the Nixon administration when the collective American psyche, as seen on film, seemed almost convulsed by its fixation on the motor vehicle. Every other week a moviegoer might see a film that could broadly be...

Sep 8, 2023 — We’re celebrating Ousmane Sembène’s centennial, reading interviews with Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Kasi Lemmons, and watching soundies.