The Call

Feb 6, 2017 — In the inaugural installment of his new column, archivist Michael Chaiken examines the Nobel Prize–winning icon’s unique artistic process through a collection of ephemera.

Jan 9, 2017 — A feast of whip-smart banter, Howard Hawks’s protofeminist take on newsroom politics is the most grown-up of all remarriage comedies.

May 1, 2015 — In his first feature, Jean-Pierre Melville found subtly radical ways to adapt Vercors's underground French novel about quiet resistance against the German occupation.

Aug 26, 2013 — From the beginning, it was clear that Rainer Werner Fassbinder was destined to shake up German cinema.

Apr 28, 2008 — The simplicity and emotional clarity of Albert Lamorisse’s 1956 The Red Balloon have made it one of the most beloved films of all time. The narrative is deceptively airy and pared down: Pascal, a young Parisian boy, retrieves a balloon...

Mar 16, 2007 — The first of his films to be shown outside Japan, Ichikawa Kon’s twenty-seventh feature dramatically raised the director’s profile.

Apr 17, 2006 — Another movie, another cause célèbre: this mysterious film by Orson Welles has been dismissed as a disaster and hailed as a masterpiece.

Jan 16, 2026 — Michael Almereyda and Radu Jude’s discussion of Eisenstein, Welles, and Godard is just one of this week’s highlights.

May 20, 2025 — Cannes 2025: Sirāt and Two Prosecutors emerge as critical favorites, while Nouvelle Vague finds both champions and detractors.

Apr 29, 2025 — In this exuberant and moving portrait of a Brooklyn sex worker, Sean Baker draws on themes he has explored throughout his career, depicting the workaday grind of twenty-first-century American existence with biting humor and clear-eyed humanity.