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The Chicago Reader

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Film, Movie Tuesday Jun 18, 2019
Movie Tuesday: The director as public intellectual

Five masterpieces from filmmakers whose work has pushed the cultural envelope
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Movie Tuesday, Abel Ferrara, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Willem Dafoe, Jean-Luc Godard, Claire Denis, Lucrecia Martel, Jia Zhang-ke, Sergei Eisenstein, Nagisa Oshima, Dušan Makavejev

Blogs, Bleader Jul 7, 2014
What the band the Walkmen taught me about watching movies

On the rock album as film-appreciation course
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Moviegoing, Film, Music, The Walkmen, Moviegoing, Claire Denis, Olivier Assayas, Robin Wood, Hitchcock's Films

Blogs, Bleader Apr 13, 2014
Weekly Top Five: Un Certain Regard winners

Highlights from the Cannes Film Festival's Un Certain Regard section.
- By Drew Hunt
- Tags: Weekly Top Five, Film, Cannes Film Festival, Palme d'Or, Jane Campion, Un Certain Regard, Marie Amachoukeli, Claire Burger, Samuel Theis, Party Girl, Claire Denis, Hong Sang-Soo, Manoel de Oliveira, Jean-Luc Godard, Blissfully Yours, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Tulpan, Sergey Dvortsevoy, Dogtooth, Yorgos Lanthimos, Hahaha, SAIC, Hong-Sang Soo, Cristi Puiu, The Death of Mr. Lăzărescu

Blogs, Bleader Dec 24, 2013
The year in movie revivals, H through N

The second in a three-part series on the year's best repertory screenings
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Year in Review, Film, Revival screenings, Music Box Theatre, Happy Birthday Wanda June, Kurt Vonnegut, Nightingale Cinema, Eyeworks Festival of Experimental Animation, Harry Smith, Heaven and Earth Magic, An Inn in Tokyo, Yasujiro Ozu, Second Saturday Silent Cinema, Gene Siskel Film Center, Shohei Imamura, Karayuki-san: The Making of a Prostitute, Doc Films, L.A. Plays Itself, Fred Halsted, White Light Cinema, Nanni Moretti, The Mass Is Over, Chicago International Film Festival, We Have a Pope, Max et les Ferailleurs, Claude Sautet, Michel Piccoli, Romy Schneider, Mestizo, African Diaspora Film Festival, Facets Multimedia, Mario Handler, Venezuela, Guillermo Meneses, Moi un Noir, Jean Rouch, ethnography, Ivory Coast, No Fear No Die, Claire Denis, Isaach de Bankole, Alex Descas, No Vietnamese Ever Called Me Nigger, Film Studies Center, South Side Projections

Blogs, Bleader Dec 22, 2013
My favorite Chicago movie premieres of 2013, 20-11

The second in a multipart series on my favorite new movies of the year
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Year in Review, Film, Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus, Sebastian Silva, Michael Cera, Gaby Hoffmann, Magic Magic, The Act of Killing, Joshua Oppenheimer, year in review, 2013 movies, Chicago International Film Festival, The Immigrant, James Gray, Frank Borzage, The Butler, Lee Daniels, Oprah Winfrey, Prince Avalanche, David Gordon Green, The Taste of Money, Im Sang-soo, The President's Last Bang, See You Next Tuesday, Drew Tobia, La Jaula de Oro, Diego Quemada-Diez, Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright, The World's End, Bastards, Claire Denis, The Unspeakable Act, Dan Sallitt

Film, Movie Review Dec 11, 2013
Recommended
John Akomfrah's collage of the humanities

Black Cinema House revisits a radical chronicler of the African diaspora.
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Movie Review, Claire Denis, Gene Siskel Film Center, European colonialism, African diaspora, John Akomfrah, Black Cinema House, Seven Songs for Malcolm X, The Last Angel of History, Kwame Nkrumah, pan-Africanism, Rainer Wener Fassbinder, Andrei Tarkovsky, Derek Jarman, Sebastiane, Black Audio Film Collective, Seven Songs, Last Angel, Sun Ra, George Clinton, Lee "Scratch" Perry, Bernard A. Harris Jr., George Clinton, Malcolm X, Recommended

Blogs, Bleader Dec 4, 2013
This week in Claire Denis: A correspondence with Melika Bass and Lori Felker about The Intruder and Bastards

A discussion about the groundbreaking French director's formal strategies with two artists who have worked in film
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Art House, Foreign, Film, Claire Denis, The Intruder, Bastards, William Faulkner, Sanctuary, Melika Bass, Lori Felker, Agnes Godard, digital video, French cinema, Vincent Lindon, Michel Subor

Blogs, Bleader Nov 29, 2013
Video
Sperm blowout, hoop dreams deferred, and the rest of this week's screenings

New reviews and notable screenings in this week's issue
- By J.R. Jones
- Tags: Film, Delivery Man, Starbuck, Vince Vaughn, Lenny Cooke, Ben Safdie, Joshua Safdie, Third Ward TX, Joe Swanberg, All the Light in the Sky, Jane Adams, Claire Denis, Bastards, Kasi Lemmons, Black Nativity, Forest Whitaker, Angela Bassett, Langston Hughes, Disney Frozen, Hans Christian Andersen, Homefront movie, Jason Statham, Sylvester Stallone, Michael Powell, Emeric Pressberger, Black Narcissus, The Red Shoes, Gene Siskel Film Center, Joe Dante, The Burbs, University of Chicago Doc Films, Olivier Assayas Carlos, Jean-Luc Godard Contempt, Joseph Losey, The Servant, Claire Denis, The Intruder, W.C. Fields, Million Dollar Legs, Joel McCrea, Girls About Town, Terence Davies, Of Time and the City, Dario Argento, Suspiria, Patio Theater Chicago, The Sound of Music, Music Box Chicago, Block Museum of Art, Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, Inside Llewyn Davis, Logan Center for the Arts, From 2337 West Monroe Street, Fred Hampton, Greg Sestero, The Disaster Artist, The Room movie, Cinema Minima, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deck the Holodeck, Cole's Bar, Chicago movies, Video

Blogs, Bleader Nov 27, 2013
This week in Claire Denis: Talking with Columbia professor Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa (and others) about No Fear, No Die and 35 Shots of Rum

A conversation about the French filmmaker's two films about immigrant communities in France, No Fear, No Die (1990) and 35 Shots of Rum (2008)
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Poetry, Film, Claire Denis, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa, Jerry & Me, 35 Shots of Rum, No Fear No Die, Alex Descas, Cockfighter, Monte Hellman, Yasujiro Ozu, Late Spring, colonialism, Jean-Claude Brialy, Frantz Fanon, John Cassavetes, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Abbas Kiarostami, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Cafe Lumiere, Five Dedicated to Ozu, Chester Himes, Jean-Luc Godard, nouvelle vague, Jacques Rivette, Isaach de Bankolé, Agnes Varda

Blogs, Bleader Nov 22, 2013
Video
Jia Zhang-ke, Alexander Payne, Stephen Frears, and the rest of this week's screenings

New reviews and notable screenings in this week's issue
- By J.R. Jones
- Tags: Film, Jia Zhang-ke, A Touch of Sin, Music Box Chicago, Alexander Payne Nebraska, Bruce Dern, Will Forte, Stephen Frears, Philomena, Judi Dench, Steve Coogan, American Promise, Baby the Rain Must Fall, Steve McQueen, Lee Remick, Delivery Man, Vince Vaughn, The Hunger Games Catching Fire, Newlyweeds, Oh Boy, Terence Davies, The House of Mirth, University of Chicago Doc Films, John Cassaevete, Opening Night, David Fincher, The Social Network, Claire Denis, 35 Shots of Rum, Gene Siskel Film Center, Robert Zemeckis, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Chicago Food Film Festival, film festivals, movies, Video

Blogs, Bleader Nov 20, 2013
This week in Claire Denis: Talking with Andrea Gronvall about I Can't Sleep and Trouble Every Day

A conversation about two of the French filmmaker's most challenging and most lurid films
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Women's Issues, LGBT, Film, Claire Denis, Andrea Gronvall, Trouble Every Day, I Can't Sleep, Vincent Gallo, Beatrice Dalle, Alex Descas, vampires, AIDS, French cinema, female filmmakers, Michelangelo Antonioni, L'Avventura, L'Eclisse, Richard Courcet, Katerina Golubeva, Robin Wood, Agnes Godard, Like Father Like Son, Hirokazu Kore-eda, humanism, Jean-Paul Sartre, Nancy Meyers

Blogs, Bleader Nov 13, 2013
This week in Claire Denis: Talking to the Nightingale's Christy LeMaster about Nenette et Boni and Beau Travail

The second in a series of discussions about the renowned French filmmaker with Chicago-based female critics, artists, and academics
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Art House, Foreign, Women's Issues, Film, Claire Denis, Christy LeMaster, Nightingale Cinema, Nenette et Boni, Beau Travail, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Gregoire Colin, globalization, Gene Siskel Film Center, Billy Budd, Herman Melville, Benjamin Britten, Djibouti, postcolonialism

Blogs, Bleader Nov 8, 2013
Video
LGBT, PFFA, and the rest of TWS*

New reviews and notable screenings in this week's issue
- By J.R. Jones
- Tags: Opening, Film, Polish Film Festival in America, Andrzej Wajda, Walesa Man of Hope, Reeling: The Chicago LGBT International Film Festival, Drew Hunt, Alain Guiraudie, Stranger By the Lake, Dallas Buyers Club, Matthew McConaughey, Jared Leto, Eyeworks Festival of Experimental Animation, Nightingale Chicago, The Motel Life, Willy Vlautin, The Trials of Muhammad Ali, Bill Siegel, The Weather Underground, How I Live Now, Marvel Comics, Thor: The Dark World, Claire Denis, Beau Travail, Nenette and Boni, Gene Siskel Film Center, David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, University of Chicago Doc Films, Marx Brothers, Duck Soup, Music Box, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Good Men, Good Women, Elaine May, Mikey and Nicky, Haile Gerima, Sankofa, University of Chicago Logan Center for the Arts, Ben Stiller, Zoolander, Logan Theater Chicago, Mostra IV: Brazilian Film Series in Chicago, Natural Life documentary, Tirtza Even, film festivals, movies, Video

Blogs, Bleader Nov 6, 2013
This week in Claire Denis: Talking to local critic Marilyn Ferdinand about Chocolat and White Material

The first in a series of conversations about the noted French filmmaker, the subject of a monthlong retrospective at the Gene Siskel Film Center
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Women's Issues, Film, History, Claire Denis, Chocolat, White Material, Gene Siskel Film Center, Marilyn Ferdinand, Ferdy on Films, Shane Truax, female filmmakers, globalization, French colonialism, Tabu, colonialism, Miguel Gomes, The Invisible Collection, Caryl Churchill, Cloud 9, Landscapes of Loss, Naomi Greene, Muriel, Alain Resnais

Blogs, Bleader Oct 15, 2013
At CIFF: Suzanne and the slow, steady progress of director Katell Quillévéré

Thoughts on the French director's second feature, playing in this year's Chicago International Film Festival
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Film, Katell Quillévéré, Suzanne, Love Like Poison, French film, Chicago International Film Festival, Claire Denis, Olivier Assayas, Maurice Pialat, André Téchiné, Mia Hansen-Løve, female filmmakers

Blogs, Bleader May 1, 2013
In Another Country: Hong Sang-soo's visions and revisions

The South Korean filmmaker's collaboration with French actress Isabelle Huppert is now available on DVD.
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Narcissism, On Video, Film, In Another Country, Hong Sang-soo, Isabelle Huppert, Philip Roth, Paul Auster, Lou Reed, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, Jeonju International Film Festival, Claire Denis, Lou Reed, autobiographical fiction, Yasujiro Ozu, Luis Bunuel, South Korean cinema

Blogs, Bleader Jul 20, 2012
L'auteur de la semaine: Benoit Jacquot

Considering how Farewell, My Queen, opening this week, fits into director Benoit Jacquot's varied body of work
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Foreign, Film, Benoit Jacquot, Farewell My Queen, French cinema, Andre Techine, Bertrand Bonello, Claire Denis, Bruno Dumont, Facets Multimedia, European Union Film Festival, Seventh Heaven, A Single Girl, The School of Flesh, Marie Antoinette, French Revolution, The Disenchanted, Lea Seydoux

Blogs, Bleader May 25, 2012
Video
Film Center presents a digital restoration of The Gold Rush and other notable screenings

New reviews and notable screenings in this week's issue
- By J.R. Jones
- Tags: Film, Gene Siskel Film Center, Charles Chaplin, The Gold Rush, Elia Kazan, Wild River, Portage theater, Northwest Chicago Film Society, Battleship movie, Ben Sachs, Hick movie, Chloe Grace Moretz, Hysteria movie, Hugh Dancy, Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Man Who Will Come, Marzabotto, Men in Black 3, Polisse movie, Wallander: The Revenge, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, All About Eve, Northbrook Public Library, Peter Jackson, Dead Alive, Music Box, Steven Spielberg, E.T. the Extra Terrestrial, Lee Chang-dong, Poetry movie, Doc Films, Josef von Sternberg, The Scarlet Empress, Claire Denis, 35 Shots of Rum, Block Museum of Art, River East 21, Crown Village 18, Pixar, Ratatouille movie, Up movie, WALL-E, movies, Video

Blogs, Bleader Mar 8, 2012
This week in ones and zeros

A preview of the Jeonju Digital Project shorts program, playing Sunday and Wednesday at the EU Film Festival
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Film, Jeonju Digital Project, Claire Denis, Jose Luis Guerin, Jean-Marie Straub, To the Devil, Memories of a Morning, An Heir, European Union Film Festival, Gene Siskel Film Center

Blogs, Bleader Feb 8, 2012
Gene Siskel Film Center announces schedule for the 15th annual European Union Film Festival

A preview of the 15th annual European Union Film Festival, beginning on March 2
- By Ben Sachs
- Tags: Film, European Union Film Festival, Gene Siskel Film Center, Bruno Dumont, Hors Satan, Jose Luis Guerin, Claire Denis, Jean-Marie Straub, Sleeping Sickness, Ulrich Kohler, Jan Hrebejk, Yorgos Lanthimos, Alps

Blogs, Bleader Nov 18, 2010
Video
This Week's Movie Action

New reviews and notable screenings in this week's issue.
- By J.R. Jones
- Tags: Film, Tony Scott, Unstoppable, Denzel Washington, Chris Pine, Paul Haggis, The Next Three Days, Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks, Claire Denis, White Material, Music Box, Isabelle Huppert, Boxing Gym, Frederick Wiseman, Budrus, The Damned movie, Four Boxes, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1, Monsters movie, Samson & Delilah, Skyline movie, Today's Special, Daily Show With Jon Stewart, Aasif Mandvi, Stanley Kubrick, Full Metal Jacket, Doc Films, Ousmane Sembene, Moolaade, DuSable Museum of African American History, Alfred Hitchcock Psycho, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, D.W. Griffith, True Heart Susie, movies, Video

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