FEATURES
12 YEARS A SLAVE
By Graham Fuller
An abducted freeman is sold into servitude in Steve McQueen’s exacting depiction of antebellum slavery
NEBRASKA
By Larry Gross
A trip to collect an illusory fortune helps a son to understand the life of his father in Alexander Payne’s seriocomic road movie
A TOUCH OF SIN
By Tony Rayns
The New China’s loss of social cohesion leads to violence in the four authentically grim tales that comprise Jia Zhang-ke’s new film
ERASERHEAD & KILLER OF SHEEP
By J. Hoberman
Out on the margins in the late Seventies, a rookie critic encountered two pioneering outliers that still cast long shadows across the indie landscape
NORTE, THE END OF HISTORY
By Noel Vera
A Crime and Punishment update from Lav Diaz, the tireless maverick of Philippine cinema
STORIES WE’RE TOLD
By Howard Hampton
A FILM COMMENT mainstay’s memoir of his roughneck Hollywood father
THE GRANDMASTER
By Andrew Chan
Wong Kar Wai comes out kicking, but in the end he’s a lover not a fighter
THE PARADISE TRILOGY
By Holly Willis
Austria’s Ulrich Seidl lays bare the modern malaise behind the sexual, religious, and romantic longings of three women
DEPARTMENTS
Editor’s Letter
OPENING SHOTS
News, Hot Property: Hany Abu-Assad’s Omar, Alex Cox’s 10,000 Ways to Die: Norman Jewison’s Rollerball, Site Specifics: Alternate Movie Databases, Trivial Top 20®: Best Actor/Director Collaborations, Restoration Row
OLAF’S WORLD
Lene Berg by Olaf Möller
SOUND & VISION
Paul McCarthy by Violet Lucca and Jack Goldstein by Chris Chang
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS
Peter Morgan by Harlan Jacobson
A FACE IN THE CROWD
Glenn Anders by Chuck Stephens
Critics’ choice
Eight critics rate 25 new releases
Screenings
Bastards & Trouble Every Day by Max Nelson, Drinking Buddies by Dan Sullivan, Alan Partridge by Jonathan Romney, Mother of George by Kristin M. Jones, American Promise by Jennifer Dworkin
SHORT TAKES
All Is Lost by Nicolas Rapold, Camille Claudel 1915 by Chris Chang, Enough Said by Violet Lucca, Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction by Chris Chang, La Maison de la radio by Nicolas Rapold, Touchy Feely by Emma Myers
HOME MOVIES
Lost & Found: American Treasures from the New Zealand Film Archive by Max Nelson, Seconds by Chuck Stephens, Kidnapped by Maitland McDonagh, The Curtis Harrington Short Film Collection by Peter Tonguette, The Damned by Jordan Osterer, The Molly Maguires by Nicolas Rapold, Behind the Candelabra by Violet Lucca, Betty Boop: The Essential Collection Volume 1 by David Filipi, The White Dawn by David Gregory Lawson, World War Z by Calum Marsh
Readings
William Wyler: The Life and Films of Hollywood’s Most Celebrated Director by Gabriel Miller, reviewed by Kent Jones; The Journey of G. Mastorna: The Film Fellini Didn’t Make, translated by Marcus Perryman, reviewed by Michael Joshua Rowin; Freddie Francis: The Straight Story from Moby Dick to Glory by Freddie Francis with Tony Dalton, reviewed by Peter Tonguette; American Ethnographic Film and Personal Documentary by Scott MacDonald, reviewed by Violet Lucca
graphic detail
Guy Peellaert by Adrian Curry
