The Best of 2021
In some ways, this is the best of times for a film buff, with new selections more readily accessible than they ever have been, either in theaters or online.
Film-Forward
Nightmare Alley
What film noir—which this still is even though it is shot in color, and heavy on garish reds—has a 150-minute running time?
West Side Story
The one individual who has the largest imprint on this 21st-century retelling is its screenwriter, Tony Kushner, more so than its director, Steven Spielberg.
The Summit of the Gods
This vertigo-inducing animated feature offers proof that 2D provides just as many stomach-turning, vicarious thrills (or fears) as 3-D animation.
Licorice Pizza
Both leads, who make their film debut here, have an easy rapport, and the comedy coasts along largely on their charms.
The Rossellinis, Exposing Muybridge | DOC NYC 2021
Once more, the Rossellini family is a gift to filmmakers, while another documentary tells all on an important figure in photographic history.
Once Upon a Time in Uganda; Film, the Living Record of Our Memory; The Real Charlie Chaplin | DOC NYC 2021
The festival has continued with an adjustment it made last year. It will continue to offer the bulk of its programming online for U.S. viewers from November 19-28.
Belfast
One might think that a film named after the capital of Northern Ireland and set in 1969 just as the Troubles were heating up wouldn’t give you the warm and fuzzies. Yet Kenneth Branagh’s semiautobiographical film does.
