Major Dundee (Columbia Pictures

J. J. Murphy is a professor emeritus of film at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He is the author of four major books on independent cinema, including Rewriting Indie Cinema: Improvisation, Psychodrama, and the Screenplay (Columbia University Press, 2019) and The...

Oct 9, 2012 — British wartime audiences ate up these rule-breaking costume pictures—entertainments for a populace seeking escapism.

Feb 24, 2010 — Major Barbara: Stage to Screen It was one of the most improbable linkups in the history of either theater or cinema—as unlikely as Andrew Undershaft’s turning over his munitions empire to Adolphus Cusins, his not-quite-yet son-in-law (and newly declared “foundling”),...

Aug 25, 2026 — The pioneering husband-and-wife duo transformed the field of Japanese nonfiction cinema with their portraits of spectacular, edgy personalities and collectives under duress.

Aug 11, 2026 — Set in 1930s French West Africa, Bertrand Tavernier’s hard-to-classify adaptation of the Jim Thompson novel Pop. 1280 offers an apocalyptic vision of a society in which institutions have abdicated their moral authority.

Jul 14, 2026 — One of the funniest and most affecting scenes in 1970s Hollywood cinema is also one of the most quietly radical—no small feat in a decade of movies marked by wiggy experimentation, explosions of brutal and cathartic violence, and shaggy new...

Jun 16, 2026 — The debut in 1998 of Lisa Cholodenko’s first feature film, High Art, was a triumph. The intense mastery of its form and the freshness of its narrative created waves of excitement—from the Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Waldo...

Jun 9, 2026 — The screenwriter, director, and novelist will take an active part in all ten screenings in a TIFF Cinematheque series.

Apr 28, 2026 — Opening with Jane Fonda’s tribute to Robert Redford, this year’s edition features several world premieres of new restorations.

Apr 14, 2026 — Consider, for a moment, the jewel thief. No, not like the gang that, at the time of this writing, recently robbed the Louvre in Paris, France. Think rather of one you might find in Paris, Paramount. After all, as director...