The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences awarded its 2017 Best Picture award to Moonlight, which was written and directed by Barry Jenkins. The tender exploration of expectations for black men, contrasted with the reality of...

Sometimes the book is better than the movie; other times, the movie comes out on top. A video discusses the topic of novels and their film adaptations, pointing out specific texts and how the tale translated to the big screen. The...

Warning or prediction? Nineteen Eighty Four is the anchor text for a series of tasks that ask readers to compare the novel to the film as well as current events to those pictured in George Orwell's dystopian classic.

Steven Soderbergh's The Limey may seem like a strange choice for one of the top ten films in a playlist on film criticism. The narrator makes clear that the story is a simple tale of revenge, but it is Soderbergh's filmmaking techniques...

A heart attack, threats of suicide, drug-fueled parties, typhoons, over 250 hours of film footage, two years of editing, Academy, Palme d'Or, and Golden Globe awards. It's time to discuss Apocalypse Now! The narrator of this episode in...

The narrator of a film criticism episode on Sofia Coppola's bittersweet Lost In Translation asks viewers to consider the many aspects of relationships that Coppola suggests are lost in translation.

Guillermo del Toro's beautiful and bloody Pan's Labyrinth, a fantasy adventure/political drama, is the focus of the ninth episode of a film criticism playlist. The narrator looks at the film through two interpretative lenses: as a story...

Did Mookie do the right thing? Spike Lee's film Do The Right Thing, which discusses race violence and community, leaves viewers to decide. The cogent analysis of a film criticism video examines not only Lee's filmmaking techniques but...

English-speaking viewers don't need to read the subtitles to understand Wong Kar-Wai's In the Mood For Love. The colors, the music, and the framing of the shots so beautifully express the emotions of the characters that dialogue, in any...

Lois Weber's ground breaking Where Are My Children is the focus of a film criticism video that explores not only Weber's treatment of the subject of abortion but also the techniques she developed to enhance the impact of her tale.

The 2014 film Selma is the focus of a film criticism video.  The narrator examines how director Ava DuVernay brought to the screen the story of the voting rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama and how she uses the tools of...

A playlist on film analysis and criticism continues with an analysis of James Cameron's 1986 sci-fi action classic Aliens, as well as why it is deserving of a place on a list of great films.

What's your favorite movie? Citizen Kane (1941) leads off a playlist on film criticism playlist that examines films that hold up due to their historical context and/or quality and deserve a spot on a best films list.

Some of the boldest films in history have been documentaries or experimental films. Explore non-narrative cinema and its avant-garde techniques with a short video about a creative faction in film history. Additionally, the video...

Explore the rich history of African, Middle Eastern, and South American cinema with a video summary of the most prominent filmmakers from these regions in the 20th and 21st centuries. It discusses Egyptian filmmakers Asmaa El-Bakry and...

Hollywood is the place to go if you want to make movies—right? Not necessarily. A fascinating video about the history of 20th century Asian cinema discusses the reflections of Japanese culture in the works of directors Yasujiro Ozu,...

Home movies have come a long way from projecting 8mm film onto a wrinkled sheet on the living room wall. Learn about the ways home movie technology has evolved alongside the film industry with a video that covers techniques such as the...

The formulaic films that once thrilled audiences in the early part of the 20th century now seemed stale after the stark reality of World War II. Foreign films and American independent cinema answered the call for authenticity, leading to...

Did movies save America during the Great Depression? Or did the Great Depression save movies? Learn more about the Golden Age of Hollywood with a video that covers the five major film studios, the colorization of big budget movies, and...

The most impressive movie you've ever seen can't compare to the astonishment audiences felt when feature films began to synchronize sound with the picture. Learn about the complex path to the talkie, including the invention of the...

Movies have come a long way since the first talkies. The credits that roll at the end of a movie lists a bewildering number of titles for those involved in sound production. Learn everything you want to know about what these roles entail...

An episode of a film history playlist looks at camera technology and the roles of the various operators. The narrator presents an overview of different types of film camera lenses, apertures, shutter speed, frame rates, ISO, and codex....

Young filmmakers watch a short overview of the major studios, players, and political events of the period between 1894 and 1929. In addition, the video narrator briefly outlines the Hollywood scandals that lead to the development of the...

New ventures and new technologies require new ways of referring to things. In stepped Edwin S. Porter, whose films Life of an American Fireman and The Great Train Robbery used parallel action and cross-cutting to develop his narratives....