'Gloria Bell': Silent Suffering and Disco Dancing in Late Capitalism
Gloria Bell painfully conveys that this economic system thrives on our isolation.
23 Jan 2020
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Richard Fleischer's 'Trapped' Escapes from Noir Obscurity
Thanks to Richard Fleischer's Trapped, Lloyd Bridges got the chance to shine in a starring role as unregenerate slimeball Tris Stewart, among the most amoral self-centered leads in noir.
22 Jan 2020
In Sophie Hyde's 'Animals', the Party Must End, Already
Animals is both a personal and creative coming of age story, and a satisfying yet frustrating tale about avoiding the tragedy of getting left behind.
16 Jan 2020
No Sanctuary in the Light: The Story of Temple Drake
The Story of Temple Drake grapples with the unbidden, unsettling force of emergent sexuality.
13 Jan 2020
In Defense of Enjoying Tom Hooper's 'Cats'
Critics and audiences have made much fun of Tom Hooper's Cats. The laugh is on them.
13 Jan 2020
Sam Wasson's 'The Big Goodbye' Puts Roman Polanski's 'Chinatown' in Its Place
Social historian Sam Wasson's The Big Goodbye: Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood, is a graceful and compelling elegy to both Roman Polanski's landmark film, and the end times of old Hollywood.
09 Jan 2020
The Last Laugh: Everything You Think You Know About 'Joker' Is Wrong
Todd Phillips has planted a tantalizing trail of clues throughout Joker to upend viewers' most basic assumptions, presenting a film whose contradictory structure can cause as much mayhem as its titular character.
08 Jan 2020
'You' S2 Returns as Bitingly Entertaining and Subversive, t​o a Point
What is it about Penn Badgley's toxic and creepy Joe Goldberg in You that keeps viewers coming back?
08 Jan 2020
Leaving Is Just as Hard as Loving in 'Marriage Story'
Noah Baumbach's attention to the daily agonies of divorce in Marriage Story displays love's enduring power—or at least, its residue.
07 Jan 2020
Saint of Heart: Jean-Claude Brisseau's 'Céline'
Brisseau's Céline thoroughly explores the misgivings and desires of women on the brink of emotional collapse.
06 Jan 2020
When Real Life Begins: On Fellini's 'The White Sheik'
Fellini is the master of blurring the lines between the real and the surreal, demonstrating the overriding imbrication of the familiar and the fantastic. In The White Sheik, currently playing at NYC's Film Forum, he inspires wonder and bemusement.
31 Dec 2019
'Uncut Gems' Is an Embarrassment of Riches
Adam Sandler's career-defining performance in the Safdie Brothers' Uncut Gems is a gritty thrill ride into the psyche of an adrenaline junky.
17 Dec 2019
In 'Uncut Gems' Adam Sandler's Howard Ratner Is on the Brink of Everything, or Nothing
The Safdie Brothers' nervy ball of tension, #PMPick Uncut Gems, sends a hustler blasting recklessly through a city where everybody is on the make.
13 Dec 2019
Oh, That Tiger!: Fritz Lang's Indian Epics
Fritz Lang's The Tiger of Eschnapur and The Indian Tomb are hothouse flowers of cinema with gyrating dancers, man-eating tigers, pagan magic, groaning lepers, and mythic moments. Has Lang ever come up with more desperate, mad, or heroic symbols of futile struggle?
12 Dec 2019
Surreal Visions of a Girls' Boarding School in Jacqueline Audry's 'Olivia'
The world always has a reason why sex is wrong, so perhaps the most subversive element in Jacqueline Audry's Olivia is its refusal to condemn.
11 Dec 2019
The Power of Looking Compels 'Portrait of a Lady on Fire'
Set in 18th century France, Céline Sciamma's Portrait of a Lady on Fire applies ravishing historical details to the timeless poetry of forbidden love.
10 Dec 2019
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