The Criterion Collection
Essays
Jan 29, 2001 — Masahiro Shinoda’s historical drama uses traditional elements of Japanese theater to explore the tension between ethics and eroticism.
Essays
Apr 24, 2000 — PREFACE Aman who dozes, his mouth half open, in front of a wood fire, lets slip some secrets from that night of the human body that is called the soul, over which he is no longer master. The sentry of...
Essays
Nov 22, 1999 — Grand Illusion is the masterpiece that earned Jean Renoir enormous acclaim in the United States, exciting the admiration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and running for 26 weeks in New York after its opening in September 1938. Banned in Italy...
Essays
Jun 5, 1995 — Kenji Mizoguchi departed abruptly from his earlier sentimental films into a world of acute realism with this bold critique of the position of women in contemporary Japanese society.
Essays
Dec 9, 1985 — Movie thrillers may come and go, but after half a century, Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps still reigns supreme. And not only for the sheer, breathless excitement of the story; the seamless construction; the chilling, beautifully realized atmosphere; and the...
Sep 16, 2025 — A portrait of a new generation of feminist consciousness in the New York art world, Lizzie Borden’s first film project spikes with a persistent friction between the filmmaker and her documentary subjects.
Aug 28, 2024 — Albert Brooks and Debbie Reynolds are at their comedic best in this tale of parent-child bonding filled with Oedipal humor and emotional insight.
The Daily
Mar 28, 2022 — Despite wins to celebrate, the Oscars got off on the wrong foot—and then took a turn for the worse.