The Criterion Collection
Apr 30, 2009 — The concept of “obscenity” is tested when we dare to look at something that we desire to see but have forbidden ourselves to look at. When we feel that everything has been revealed, “obscenity” disappears and there is a certain...
Nov 16, 2008 — Chungking Express (1994) was the Masculin féminin of the 1990s, a pop-art movie about cool twentysomethings looking for love in the city that has replaced Paris as the center of the world-cinema imagination. What Jean-Luc Godard did for “the children...
Nov 19, 2007 — Akira Kurosawa explores criminal machismo in his seventh film, which he felt was his official breakthrough in Japanese cinema.
Sep 3, 2007 — Jim Jarmusch is a difficult director because he works from the frontiers. What does it mean to be a “frontier” director in the film world today?It means a clear refusal, for ethical and aesthetic reasons, to be part of the...
Essays
Jun 11, 2007 — Claude Berri’s witty comedy-drama depicts Nazi sympathizers with three-dimensional candor, neither whitewashing nor apologizing for their misguided ideas.
Feb 16, 2004 — In this quintessential noir, Samuel Fuller breaks with the Red Scare formula of his contemporaries by contrasting the faceless evil of Communism against the peccadilloes of the workaday American crook.
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...
Jun 24, 1990 — Some films have become famous simply because they’ve sold a lot of tickets. Others have major studio publicity machines behind them, the better to hog the spotlight. Still others earn their fame the hard way through genuine critical acclaim. But...
Nov 16, 2021 — Tsui Hark’s epic martial-arts saga revolutionized Hong Kong cinema by presenting a complex portrait of modern Chinese history and setting a gold standard in action choreography.
May 10, 2016 — Nicholas Ray’s In a Lonely Place imbues the conventions of film noir with a subtle, tense vulnerability that lends a naturalistic weight to the film’s powerful emotional impact.