We the Poor

May 20, 2010 — Driven to Destruction Nagisa Oshima was a destructive force in Japanese cinema—and he wouldn’t have had it any other way. Intent on exploding taboos and jabbing the eye of the status quo, he created films that leave us with a...

Jan 21, 2008 — In September 1997, I saw Agnès Varda introduce a brand-new 35 mm print of her first feature film, La Pointe Courte (made in 1954), to an admiring audience at Yale University. More astonishing than the luminous black-and-white images was Varda’s...

Nov 7, 2005 — Often appearing on lists of the ten greatest films of all time, called one of the most beautiful films ever made, or the most masterful work of Japanese cinema, Ugetsu comes to us awash in superlatives. No less acclaimed has...

May 26, 2003 — Despite its modest claims, Volker Schlöndorff’s twelfth film—about the near-civil war that raged in the Baltic provinces in the early twenties—is a jewel among his creations.

Mar 5, 1990 — Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist masterwork is one of the greatest portraits of old age and loneliness ever brought to the screen.

Jun 23, 2026 — The only favor I ever asked of a twink was for tickets to see John Waters introduce two of his films. I was the sole trans filmmaker enrolled in my school’s program, and I felt it was my right to...

Nov 23, 2021 — First and foremost, Menace II Society is a movie for white people.These aren’t my words. These are the words of Albert Hughes, who codirected the movie with his twin brother, Allen. In several interviews, Albert has mentioned how he and...

Nov 2, 2020 — Two decades before his inspired turn in Parasite (2019) as a chiseling patriarch—The Man With No Plan—Song Kang-ho became a symbol of new wave South Korean cinema by starring in a pair of iconic films as the movement was beginning...

Apr 30, 2019 — With these twin monuments of Hong Kong action filmmaking, Jackie Chan catapulted to international stardom, perfecting a unique blend of athleticism and populism.

Sep 19, 2011 — When Claude Chabrol’s first film, Le beau Serge, had its premiere at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival (out of competition), a fellow critic at Cahiers du cinéma, François Truffaut, wrote: “Technically, the film is as masterly as if Chabrol had...