To Be or Not to Be

Oct 22, 2019 — Muhammad Ali was thirty-two years old when he arrived in Kinshasa, Zaire, in 1974 to fight for the heavyweight championship of the world. Thirty-two is not prohibitively old for a boxer in the heavyweight division. (As I type, the most...

Aug 13, 2019 — As Toronto’s full lineup nears completion, New York looks to expand upon “our notions of what the moving image can do and be.”

May 24, 2019 — Elia Suleiman, who returned to Cannes this year with his latest film, talks with us about comedy as a form of political resistance.

Jun 27, 2017 — Alfred Hitchcock brings a spirit of cinematic ingenuity to a thin narrative, resulting in a flawed but fascinating film that contains one of the most virtuosic sequences in his filmography.

May 23, 2017 — In one of the first major films to confront the contemporary refugee crisis in Europe, Jacques Audiard brings a genre-busting approach to an explosive subject.

May 2, 2017 — On a trip to the Library of Congress’s Mostly Lost workshop—affectionately known as “film-geek heaven”—Imogen Sara Smith joined early-cinema aficionados in uncovering treasures from the vaults.

Sep 12, 2016 — Before kicking off a week run of To Sleep with Anger at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the influential director joined us for a conversation about how his encounters with international cinema inspired him as a filmmaker of color.

Apr 4, 2016 — Ray Dolby did not match the conventional image of an eccentric inventor, nor that of a business mogul. But his name now represents a benchmark by which the recording of sound and its playback on disc and in movie theaters...

Mar 29, 2016 — Les Blank’s long-lost documentary revels in the trippy, eccentric world of and surrounding Tulsa Sound pioneer Leon Russell, transforming what might have been a standard concert movie into a genuine work of art.

Apr 16, 2013 — With its idiosyncratic humor, killer soundtrack, and middle finger to Reagan-era politics, Alex Cox’s film was the perfect cult hit for the golden age of the video store.