The Big Year

Sep 25, 2025 — To celebrate Robert Altman’s centennial, we invited five writers—Howard Hampton, Bruce LaBruce, Violet Lucca, Christina Newland, and Carlos Valladares—to each explore a favorite lesser-known gem from the great director’s filmography.

Feb 18, 2025 — In her mainstream breakthrough, director Joan Micklin Silver envisions New York City through the eyes of a complicated, searching woman trying to figure out her place in the world.

Feb 23, 2024 — Revivals of work by Raoul Peck and Jean-Pierre Bekolo and conversations with James Gray and Jodie Foster are among this week’s highlights.

Sep 25, 2023 — This month brings collections on Straub-Huillet and Whit Stillman, an Anna May Wong biography, and a novel starring Marilyn Monroe.

Jul 25, 2023 — A master class in dramatic tension and pacing, Carl Franklin’s neonoir masterpiece explores the desperate energy and desperate deeds that fuel real crime.

Sep 22, 2021 — No one’s claiming that Cry Macho is a great movie, but plenty are moved to reflect on what Eastwood has meant to us over all these years.

Aug 10, 2021 — Hirokazu Kore-eda’s international breakthrough is a bittersweet meditation on mortality, memory, and the movies.

Apr 8, 2021 — The London-based, British Ghanaian artist and filmmaker Larry Achiampong explores race, class, and history in a multidisciplinary practice that, as described in the biography on his website, seeks to “examine his communal and personal heritage—in particular, the intersection between pop...

Nov 19, 2020 — For most of my life, makeover sequences in film comedies held an irresistible allure. The mousy young woman who realizes her own inner and outer (but mostly outer) beauty after receiving the attentions of the right man (or the right...

Nov 13, 2020 — We’re keeping busy with online festivals, awards nominations, remembrances, and plenty of weekend reading.