Tracing Slavery’s Past Tracing Slavery’s Past
On the bicentennial of the abolition of the slave trade, a documentarian tries to come to grips with her family's history in the trade.
Mar 14, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Te-Ping Chen
Our Troubled Youth Our Troubled Youth
Exploring the unexpected: Chop Shop, Paranoid Park, Vantage Point.
Mar 6, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
The Film We Dreamed The Film We Dreamed
In Zeroville, Steve Erickson explores New Hollywood's promise and doom and the dissolution of cinema into spectacle.
Feb 19, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Charles Taylor
Cool Devastation Cool Devastation
American movie-goers finally get to see Cristian Mungiu's stunning 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.
Feb 7, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
A Hard Man A Hard Man
Paul Thomas Anderson's masterful There Will Be Blood pits an oil baron against a preacher in an epic contest of wills.
Jan 10, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
The Defiant Ones The Defiant Ones
Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis are two inmates in a Southern prison who learn to unshackle themselves from hatred.
Jan 9, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Robert Hatch
The Front Page The Front Page
One of three versions of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur's madcap newspaper comedy from a period when reporters probably did call their city rooms and say, "Hello, sweetheart, get ...
Jan 2, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Alexander Bakshy
Charlie Wilson’s War–and Ours Charlie Wilson’s War–and Ours
Unlike the plot of the latest Tom Hanks film, the blowback price of our incessant meddling could prove quite high. And even Hollywood can't put a pretty face on that one.
Jan 2, 2008 / Books & the Arts / Robert Scheer
Amnesia at the Multiplex Amnesia at the Multiplex
Two films address US adventures in Afghanistan and Pakistan, with a big dose of historical amnesia, political pandering, moral superiority and outraged innocence.
Dec 30, 2007 / Books & the Arts / Lakshmi Chaudhry
Chaos, Clocks, Juxtapositions Chaos, Clocks, Juxtapositions
With the release of the Dylan pastiche I'm Not There, Todd Haynes revises our cultural memory by adjusting familiar clichés.
Dec 6, 2007 / Books & the Arts / Kent Jones