Sign up for the Film Comment Letter today to get original film writing delivered to your inbox every week! >>

March-April 2019

Claire Denis’s High Life, Alex Ross Perry’s Her Smell, Christian Petzold’s Transit, László Nemes’s Sunset, Jafar Panahi on the process of secretly making movies, plus the not-so-secret gay history of a cult film magazine, Ari Aster on The Last Temptation of Christ, and reviews of Ash Is Purest White, Peterloo, and more

Support FC Purchase

Featured Articles

Issue Details

FEATURES

High Life
By Nick Pinkerton
Claire Denis goes beyond the infinite in one of her most daring gambits, a space journey where the darkness lies within

Her Smell
By Mark Asch
Elisabeth Moss’s riot-grrrl rocker Becky Something joins Alex Ross Perry’s cinematic roster of unforgettable characters galvanized and stunted by life

World of Dau
Feature and interview by Jonathan Romney
A movie is so much more than a movie in Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s multi-multimedia film-art installation in Paris, which encloses the visitor in a self-contained universe

Sunset
By Madeline Whittle
László Nemes, the Oscar-winning director of Son of Saul, sends viewers spiraling through the labyrinth of pre–World War I Budapest

Transit
By Imogen Sara Smith
Christian Petzold returns with another evocation of people on the verge, refugees stuck between countries—and between the present and the past

An Elephant Sitting Still
By Aliza Ma
Ambitious beyond measure, Hu Bo’s epic first feature (and, sadly, also his last) is a monumental tale of misery set in modern-day China

The Gay History of Films and Filming
By Michael Koresky
In-depth articles, reviews, and interviews provided the beard for the hidden (and sometimes not-so-hidden) queer messages of the classic British cult film magazine

Grosses Gloss
By Alberto Flores
Game-changers like ROMA and Black Panther were the big stories in a year in which box-office numbers and home-viewing habits became closer bedfellows

DEPARTMENTS & COLUMNS

THE PRE-SHOW | News, views, conversations, and other things to get worked up about
News, Inspired: Kent Jones on Diane, Release Me: Roberto Minervini’s What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire? by Nicolas Rapold, Peevish, Directions: Bi Gan by Jordan Cronk, Restoration Row: Safi Faye's Fad’jal by Max Nelson

CRITICS’ CHOICE
Critics rate and comment on new releases

MAKE IT REAL | The wide, wide world of cinematic nonfiction
Carlos Reygadas’s Our Time by Eric Hynes

ART AND CRAFT | Filmmaking according to the makers
Jafar Panahi on how he has made films secretly by Jamsheed Akrami

FINEST HOUR | One actor, one performance
Fredi Washington in The Love Wanga by Kelli Weston

OFF THE PAGE | The art of getting from book to screen
Ari Aster on The Last Temptation of Christ

CURRENTS | New and important work plucked from festivals and elsewhere
Ena Sendijarevic’s Take Me Somewhere Nice and Natsuka Kusano’s Domains by Jordan Cronk, Elmar Imanov’s End of Season by José Teodoro, and Peter Parlow’s The Plagiarists by Nicolas Rapold, and Pierre Schoeller’s One Nation, One King by Olaf Möller

FESTIVALS | Sundance
The Truth Hurts by Amy Taubin

IN MEMORIAM | Remembering the cinéastes who have passed on
Jonas Mekas by Amy Taubin
Ringo Lam by Nick Pinkerton

THE BIG SCREEN | Reviews of notable new films opening in theaters (hopefully near you)
Ash Is Purest White by Abby Sun, Gloria Bell by Molly Haskell, Peterloo by Shonni Enelow, Black Mother by José Teodoro

Short Takes: Climax by Michael Koresky, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote by Manu Yáñez Murillo, Dogman by Justin Stewart, Woman at War by Mark Asch, Suburban Birds by Chloe Lizotte

HOME MOVIES | Cinema spun, streamed, and beamed
Blood Hunger: The Films of José Larraz by Manu Yáñez Murillo, DUSTx by James Wham, The Admirable Crichton by Chloe Lizotte, A Face in the Crowd by Sheila O'Malley, Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask by Teo Bugbee, Leaving Neverland by Nicolas Rapold, Peppermint Soda by Yonca Talu, Stand-In by Steven Mears, Wish List: The Kill-Off by Laura Kern
Plus: 20 discs to watch and 20 titles to stream

READINGS | Books about all aspects of filmmaking and film culture
Ennio Morricone: In His Own Words by Alessandro De Rosa, reviewed by Julien Allen; Frame by Frame: A Materialist Aesthetics of Animated Cartoons by Hannah Frank, reviewed by Ina Diane Archer; The Hollywood Jim Crow: The Racial Politics of the Movie Industry by Maryann Erigha, reviewed by Sheila O’Malley

GRAPHIC DETAIL | The art of the movie poster
The poster art of Jakub Erol by Adrian Curry