In “Anatomy of a Scene,” we ask directors to reveal the secrets that go into making key scenes in their movies. See new episodes in the series on Fridays. You can also watch our collection of more than 150 videos on YouTube and subscribe to our YouTube channel. Redstone and piglins and creepers, oh my! … Read more
And yet in “Good Night, and Good Luck” — the title is taken from Murrow’s sign-off — Murrow comes off as a model of effective restraint, easily threading the needle of a debate that continues today. Though the Air Force’s case against the reservist sounds trumped up, Murrow merely says, “We do not know.” (The … Read more
For “When Fall Is Coming,” the French filmmaker François Ozon has cooked up a little mystery and an enigmatic heroine. A sleek, modestly scaled entertainment about families, secrets and obligations, it features fine performances and some picture-postcard Burgundian locations. It’s there in the heart of France, in a picturesque village in a large, pretty house, … Read more
Crammed to the margins with peaceable punks, vicious skinheads, ambitious rappers, racist police — oh, and a green supernatural whatsit — Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden’s “Freaky Tales” is a nostalgic homage to the music, movies and personalities of the 1980s. Set in 1987 in Oakland, where Fleck grew up, this revenge-of-the-underdogs picture unfolds through … Read more
Henry Fonda was inarguably one of the greatest actors ever produced by the United States. The Austrian filmmaker Alexander Horwath pushes this self-evident truth further in his purposefully expansive documentary “Henry Fonda for President.” The movie convincingly posits that Fonda was, cinematically, the embodiment of America itself. Horwath has gathered a vast amount of archival … Read more
The ideal way to watch “The Luckiest Man in America,” a dramatization of a real-life game show incident, is to go in cold — to see these events unfold as TV viewers did. If you’ve never heard of Michael Larson, a contestant who appeared on CBS’s “Press Your Luck” in 1984, then it is best … Read more
Frankie, the roaming, cogitating mystery woman at the center of the cryptic drama “Gazer,” has eyes as big as hubcaps and a strange charisma. Much of her appeal stems from the striking looker who plays her, Ariella Mastroianni, who wrote the script with the director, Ryan J. Sloan. Although indebted to its influences to the … Read more
Two harrowing sexual assaults occur in the first 15 minutes of “Love Hotel,” a 1985 erotic drama from the cult director Shinji Somai. First, Tetsuro (Minori Terada), a flailing Tokyo businessman in debt to the yakuza, is forced to stand by while his wife, Ryoko (Kiriko Shimizu), is raped by a mob loan shark. Later, … Read more
