As far as I am concerned, Martin Ritt made one of the greatest films in the history of English-language cinema in the form of his dark social western, Hud, a landmark of filmmaking. This film was so magnificent and powerful in both its themes and the deep exploration of some striking ideas, it made him…

During the early parts of the twentieth century, Lily (Marlene Dietrich), who has only known the life of a farmer’s daughter, undertakes the uncertain journey from her small village to Berlin, where she hopes to grow into a functional woman, surrounded by the sights and sounds of a modern city. She is set to work…

In a prolific career that has touched numerous genres and seen him tackle a wide array of stories, François Ozon has made a name for himself as a filmmaker that can do nearly anything, granted it is something that falls within his capacities as one of the finest portrayers of the human condition currently working…

Somewhere in working-class France lives Arnaud Labrède (Kévin Azaïs), a wayward young man who works as a carpenter, along with his brother (Antoine Laurent), who inherited the company from their late father, with their first solo assignment being to make him a casket after they realize that they may not be able to afford all…

Do critics matter? This is a question that has been asked in some form for about as long as art has been produced. The extent to which we have asked whether a work exist entirely objectively, without the interference of supposed experts in artistic analysis giving their opinion and determining whether something is a success…

Perhaps its a sign of having grown accustomed to nearly every kind of emotion embedded in the cinematic form, or maybe just an indication of callousness, I don’t tend to find myself brought to tears by a film very often. There are numerous occasions where I feel my heartstrings being plucked with great ferocity, and…

There’s no need to relitigate the career of Jean Renoir, since his reputation has always preceded him, right from the early days of his work as one of the most prominent French filmmakers in the post-silent era. He made many films, some of which have gone on to become unimpeachable classics, respected as if they…

No one was ever able to perfect the art of melodrama quite as well as Douglas Sirk, a director whose career is almost entirely defined by the range of intimate, profoundly moving dramas that combined familial strife with socially-charged commentary, forming complex tapestries of the human condition that were rarely anything but thoroughly riveting and…

In the pantheon of great romantic comedies, very few films have defined the genre more than Michael Gordon’s Pillow Talk. Whether through filmmakers that were heavily inspired by it, or those that outright copied the film, it has held a cultural cache that has made it one of the most iconic entries into a genre…

Julia Scott (Claudette Colbert) lives a pleasant life – she works for a reputable clothing company, being an administrative assistant that has her sights firmly set on a leadership position, which is almost entirely guaranteed, considering she has a reputation amongst her co-workers and those they report into for being a hard-working young woman who…