Sheila O'Malley

The right sort: Rhode Island airs are front and center in the 1956 musical adaptation of The Philadelphia Story, but how does the cast measure up?

Mary Ellen Bute’s Passages from James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake listens to the stream-of-consciousness song of a synesthetic masterwork

It felt like a kiss: on Doris Day and James Cagney’s under-seen film about abusive showbiz romance

With elegant force, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread curls round an ineffable, unstable romantic attention without which life is unlivable

(Greta Gerwig, USA, A24, Opening November 3)

The wonder of you: the king of rock ‘n’ roll knew that his talent lay in being himself, shining even in formulaic vehicles

(Rama 
Burshtein, Israel, Roadside Attractions, Opens May 12)

Burning bright: the Method legend blow-torched her place in acting history through just a handful of performances

Salt of the earth: Robert Duvall gives his favorite performance in a plainspoken 1972 adaptation by Horton Foote

At a tender age: two very different 1970s films show females on the verge of a nervous breakdown

Class act: equally adept at comedy and drama, the '30s star never failed to reach the back of the house