Be Truly Free

May 26, 2017 — Let’s take a quick break from the Cannes Film Festival to make note of a bit of reading we might take into the holiday weekend. There’ll be much more in a roundup to come, but for now, this entry will...

Jan 19, 2010 — A Belgian in New York It was in the 1970s, the first decade of her career, that Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman created the works that would define her. Informed as much by her brushes with the experimental film scene in...

Apr 16, 2021 — This week we’re checking in on the cinemas of Brazil and South Korea, reading about Terrence Malick, and listening in on Emma Thompson and Tony Kushner.

Nov 19, 2008 — Albert Lamorisse’s principled balancing of objective fact with childish wish fulfillment results in a new, paradoxical genre—the documentary of dreams.

Jun 25, 2024 — Barry Jenkins’s extraordinarily ambitious limited series distinguishes itself in the tradition of the cinematic slavery epic through its understanding that Black joy and Black trauma cannot be cleaved from each other.

Nov 27, 2024 — The week offers evasive icons, an archive to rummage through, and a great but overlooked critic.

May 31, 2022 — The jury gave awards to nearly half the competition, but some critical favorites missed out.

Jan 21, 2015 — Money can’t buy love and happiness in Preston Sturges’s classic comedy—or can it?

Oct 15, 2019 — Born in Denmark to a wealthy family in 1879, Benjamin Christensen dropped out of medical school to receive training as an opera singer, only to lose his singing voice to what was diagnosed as an incurable nervous illness. He then...

Mar 22, 2011 — In 1985, deep into the twelve-year reign of the Reagan-Bush administration, Rob Epstein mounted a Hollywood stage with Richard Schmiechen, both men resplendent in tuxedos. Epstein was only twenty-nine years old. The director had just made history, with producer Schmiechen,...