Blind Faith Blind Faith
From the moment when Mel Gibson began promoting The Passion of the Christ--was it only ten years ago?--he has insisted that his goal was to be true to the Gospel text.
Feb 26, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
May Fools May Fools
Bernardo Bertolucci has long fed off a cinephilia he appears to despise.
Feb 12, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Europa, Europa Europa, Europa
Considered as a subset of the road movie, the post-Holocaust, return-to-Poland documentary has been a dismayingly static genre. Most of these films are journeys in only the physi...
Jan 28, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
The Hunt for Hussein The Hunt for Hussein
About a third of the way through the long, long flashback that is Crimson Gold, someone mentions that the main character, Hussein, needs to work outdoors because of his claustrop...
Jan 15, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Crimes and Misdemeanors Crimes and Misdemeanors
An indispensable work of art, especially at this moment in our history, Errol Morris's new documentary declares its theme before you even step into the theater. The Fog of ...
Dec 24, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Go East, Young Man! Go East, Young Man!
In one of his sunnier moods, Jean-Luc Godard might have tacked onto The Last Samurai the subtitle une étrange aventure de Tom Cruise.
Dec 11, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Second Comings Second Comings
To the fleet of symbolic vehicles currently cruising the screen--their number includes the "Pussy Wagon" that Uma Thurman (in Kill Bill) coldly claims as her own--we may now add ...
Nov 26, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
A Documentary Coup A Documentary Coup
The lights go down in the courtroom, a 16-millimeter projector shoots out its beam, and into the trial blazes evidence of an unprecedented nature: not a report of criminal even...
Nov 6, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
The Avengers The Avengers
Ghosts are notorious for getting stuck in time. Having lost track of the ongoing world, they will revisit certain hours as obsessively as they haunt a fatal spot.
Oct 23, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Love Streams Love Streams
Clint Eastwood's Mystic River, which opened this year's New York Film Festival on a somber but resonant note, is perhaps the finest western ever to be set in South Boston.
Oct 9, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans