Short Film Corner

It feels weird to plead on behalf of William Wyler, who is certainly celebrated and respected and even known by a few people outside hardcore cinephilia...

Maria Schell and Marcello Mastroianni in Luchino Visconti's White Nights (1957).

I saw Dario Argento's latest, Giallo, in Edinburgh last week, and was somewhat underwhelmed.But anyone who reckons that Dario has terminally "lost it" really needs to check out his previous effort, 2007's Mother of Tears (La terza madre, aka The Third Mother)...

Above: Michael Mann (second from the right) and crew members working on Public Enemies. Photo by Rob Olewinski. I spent a few days in the summer of 2008 on the set of Michael Mann's Public Enemies, which was shooting at the time in Chicago...

Andrea Arnold's follow-up to her acclaimed Red Road (2006),follows also in the footsteps of Alan Clarke, director of films and BBC plays, whose influence has spread out in strange ways since his untimely death in 1990...

Above: The Biograph Theater in 1934 and as it appeared when re-decorated in 2008 for the production of Public Enemies. I spent a few days in the summer of 2008 on the set of Michael Mann's Public Enemies, which was shooting at the time in Chicago...

UP, UP AND AWAY At the beginning of 1969'sThe Red Tent, a Soviet-Italian co-production (perhapsthe Soviet-Italian co-production?),a film without a reputation, a group of ghosts gather for a mock-trial...

One of the creative forces behind Milkyway Image, the production company he co-founded in 1996 with director Johnnie To, Wai Ka-fai is best known for his collaborative efforts as screenwriter, producer, and co-director on over twenty films, including Fulltime Killer, Mad Detective, and this...

Cheap to fund, digitally shot portraits of everyday life compose the heart and soul of contemporary American independent film. But when a director makes the decision to reject casual naturalism, shoot on film and concentrate on visual beauty, the contrast with typical indie fare is revelatory...

Darren Hughes of Long Pauses does all Toronto Int'l Film Festival attendees a service each year by running 1st Thursday: A Guide to TIFF. If you are intending on attending the festival this year, or are curious about the programming, Darren's annual off-shoot to his own site is a great resource.

Abbas Kiarostami's Shirin continues his journey into the avant-garde world of Five Dedicated to Ozu, his 2003 excursion into long take minimalist cinematography. Ostensibly the film presents shots of an audience watching a film...

As triumph-of-the-human-spirit tales go, Kon Ichikawa's 1963 Taiheiyo hitori-botchi (distributed in some countries as My Enemy The Sea; the producers of this Eureka!/Masters of Cinema DVD editon go with the more accurate translation Alone Across The Pacific), is darker, more textured, more layered...

Opening today and running through July 5th is the New York Asian Film Festival, and the benefit this cinephile summer tentpole gives to the city’s film scene can be seen in two of its hardest hitting selections: Wai Ka-fai’s Written By and Yang Ik-joon’s Breathless...

Filmmakers Of The Week: Mohsen Mahkmalbaf and Marjane Satrapi. Neither has a current film to promote. The Harmlessly Frivolous Reason To Join Twitter Of The Week: Nicer Film Titles, illuminated here...

Finally...a motion picture that blows the lid off...BOWLING! No kidding...

What is the 21st Century? is the column where Ignatiy Vishnevetsky tries to find an answer to the titular question. *** Above: Michael Bay on the set ofTransformers: Revenge of the Fallen...

What is it with circles? Three of the best new movie posters of 2009—The Girlfriend Experience, The Limits of Control and now Moon—are awash with them. For Moon it makes perfect graphic sense...

Never Count An Auteur Out: Don't let the mere 50% rating on Rotten Tomatoes bamboozle you—Francis Ford Coppola is back...

Charles Vidor, no relation to the more celebrated King, madeGilda, ensured himself a place in the film history books with a slick and thematically fascinating noir which dazzles from the moment Glenn Ford throws a pair of outsized dice in the opening shot...

From Samuel Fuller's Merrill's Marauders (1962).

Out of town; my work takes me out of town. I empty villages. I burn their houses down. I set up factories....

What an interesting puzzle the directorial career of Michael Anderson makes. In 1955 he directs The Dam Busters, one of the most exacting and exciting films about World War II ever made up to that point in time...

The Details is a column that catches the small within the big, focusing on the individual elements that make cinema so expressive...