This Is the End

Nov 19, 2007 — Akira Kurosawa explores criminal machismo in his seventh film, which he felt was his official breakthrough in Japanese cinema.

Jul 23, 2007 — It’s hard to think of an artist who better exemplifies the obscuring ebb and flow of film history than Raymond Bernard.

Oct 23, 2006 — The New Zealand director’s debut feature is a bridge between her tentative, probing film school works and her subsequent female character studies.

Jan 31, 2005 — With this early work, Bernardo Bertolucci confidently demonstrated the instinctive lyricism and sensuality that in his maturity would become his very own signature.

Sep 29, 2003 — Fassbinder had long dreamed of a “German Hollywood film.” He sought not only success with the audience, but also professionalism. The auteur film in its purest form is an attempt to abolish the division of labor: the filmmaker represents in...

Sep 23, 2002 — The theatricality of Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller makes the point that psychoanalysis is a sister to cinema rather than a rival.

Jul 9, 2001 — John Schlesinger’s beloved dramedy subverts the conventions of British kitchen-sink realism.

Jul 8, 1992 — Since its first screening in 1960, Jean-Luc Godard’s astonishing debut has lost none of its power to thrill an audience or change the way we see the world.

May 25, 1992 — If Max Ophuls hadn’t cooled his heels in Hollywood to flee the Nazis, his name might have conjured only the most unintelligible of foreign cinema—vague and inaccessible to the average American filmgoer. But in 1948 Ophuls was given an opportunity...

Feb 11, 1990 — Bob Rafelson’s ultimate road movie is a relaxed masterpiece, a film of laid-back innovation that hasn’t aged one iota since its original release.