Greta Director Neil Jordan on the Twisted Consequences of Loneliness

It’s somewhat of a cinephilic fantasy to be terrorized by Isabelle Huppert, who has made a career out of sadomasochistic affairs (The Piano Teacher), psychopathic matriarchy (Merci Pour le Chocolat), and unconventional rape revenge (Elle). It’s eerily perfect, then, that the French actress’ latest role is that of a stalker—a seemingly genial old lady named Greta who becomes increasingly attached to,

Director Karyn Kusama Goes her Own Way

Director Karyn Kusama is one of Hollywood’s boldest voices. Her films are visually arresting, emotionally taxing and riveting to the last frame. Whether it’s a pugilist drama like Girlfight or a horror film like The Invitation, Kusama’s gifts bend genres to her will.

Her most recent film, Destroyer, was the year’s most unsettling crime thriller—by a mile. Starring Nicole Kidman in another impressive,

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’s Oscar-Nominated Directors on Being Bold

*In the run-up to this Sunday’s Oscars telecast, we’re sharing some of our favorite interviews with nominees. 

Directors Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman asked themselves a question: how could they tell a story and be as wild and bold as they could adapting a comic book to the big screen that hadn’t been seen before. Enter Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Now the three are Oscar-nominated directors,

Isabel Coixet’s Ravishing Elisa and Marcela Mark’s Netflix’s 1st Film at Berlinale

Spain legalized same-sex marriage in 2005, the first nuptials of the kind were held in the country in 1901. The true story of Elisa Sánchez Loriga and Marcela Gracia Ibeas, wed by an unwitting priest, is the subject of Isabel Coixet’s black-and-white competition entry to the 69th Berlinale film festival.

As far as the women’s intertwined lives, in Coixet’s telling, the wedding is almost a footnote. Elisa and Marcela opens in 1920s Argentina,

How Free Solo‘s Oscar-Nominated Directors get it Done

Jimmy Chin is a professional climber and filmmaker who specializes in nail-biting documentaries that take place on ludicrously sheer mountain faces. His work demands a supernatural degree of calm. Today, however, Chin sounds like just another irrepressibly stoked dude. He’s fresh from the annual luncheon for Academy Award nominees. Alfonso Cuarón, it turns out, had seen Chin’s latest film, Free Solo, which is nominated for Best Documentary Feature.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’s Oscar-Nominated Directors on Being Bold

Directors Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman asked themselves a question: how could they tell a story and be as wild and bold as they could adapting a comic book to the big screen that hadn’t been seen before. Enter Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Now the three are Oscar-nominated directors, and their film has become a critical and commercial smash hit.

The coming of age story from Sony Pictures Animation follows Miles Morales (Shameik Moore),

Cold Pursuit Director Hans Petter Moland on Liam Neeson’s Killer Plowman

In Hans Petter Moland‘s Cold Pursuit, Liam Neeson plays a humble snowplow driver named Nels Coxman living in the winter wonderland of Kehoe, Colorado. The film opens with Nels receiving Kehoe’s ‘Citizen of the Year’ award, which hs gratefully (and awkwardly) accepts. His beaming wife, Grace (Laura Dern) looks on. All is well. For roughly four minutes or so. In no time at all, the fuzzy, warm feelings give way to the title’s promise;

Director Catherine Hardwicke Delivers Gina Rodriguez as Action Star in Miss Bala

Catherine Hardwicke was 48 years old when she directed her first feature-length film. That movie, Thirteen, a dark look at a tumultuous mother-daughter relationship, garnered Golden Globe nominations for its stars, Holly Hunter and Evan Rachel Wood, as well as an Oscar nod for Hunter and an Independent Spirit Award for Nikki Reed.

Though by Hollywood standards she came a bit late to directing, the success of Thirteen demonstrated she was meant to be at the helm.

How A Dog’s Way Home‘s Director Found his Path

Remember Terry the Toad, the adorable nerdy high school kid who had a wild night in American Graffiti? And the government researcher out in the remote, bonding with the wolves out in the Arctic in Never Cry Wolf? Both were played by Charles Martin Smith, now a director who has specialized in films about kids and animals including the two Dolphin Tale movies and the current release,

Serenity Writer/Director Steven Knight on Creating a Twist no one Will See Coming

Writer-director Steven Knight is no stranger to making unconventional films. In the 2013 thriller Locke starring Tom Hardy, the entire plot takes place inside a car. For Serenity, underneath the allegory about a fisherman obsessed over catching an elusive bluefin tuna, lie deeper existential themes.

Knight admits directing can be daunting in a phone call having wrapped Peaky Blinders Season 5. “Every time I do,

Oscar Watch: Writer/Director Nadine Labaki on her Riveting Drama Capernaum

Lebanese writer-director Nadine Labaki took to the streets to make her third feature, Capernaum, which centers on a neglected young boy. Furious with his parents after they sell his barely pubescent sister to an older man, the boy runs away from his ramshackle home. He befriends an Ethiopian refugee and then becomes the caretaker for her baby after the woman is arrested.

Playing a child who shares his own first name,

A Grieving Detective Drives the Action in Film Noir State Like Sleep

Like her brooding State Like Sleep heroine Katherine Grand, filmmaker Meredith Danluck lost a close friend to suicide. Like Katherine, she moved from the United States to Belgium to live with a highly secretive partner. And like Katherine, Danluck rushed to a Brussels hospital after her mother suffered a stroke. Now currently available on Digital, On Demand, and in select theaters, State Like Sleep may draw many of its plot points from Danluck’s adult life but one of its most offbeat sequences comes straight out of a movie she saw at the age of seven.

Director Matthew Carnahan on Valley of the Boom & the Internet’s Wild West Early Days

“I certainly didn’t see it coming,” says Matthew Carnahan of the dot-com boom—as well as the bust—that he cleverly chronicles in Valley of the Boom, a National Geographic limited series premiering on January 13 that combines a scripted narrative along with documentary-style interviews.

Flashing back to his own introduction to the web in the 1990s, Carnahan recalls a friend excitedly telling him about how he was able to talk to a woman through his computer when it was hooked up to his phone line because of this thing called the Internet.

Stan & Ollie Director Revisits a Great Doubles Act

When he was a kid growing up in Scotland, filmmaker Jon. S. Baird loved Laurel and Hardy movies so much that he impersonated Stan Laurel at his school’s “fancy dress” day alongside a classmate dressed in an Oliver Hardy outfit. Three decades later, Baird pays homage to the great song-and-dance comedy team as director of Stan & Ollie. In the movie, opening wide January 11, Steve Coogan plays the duo’s rake-thin mastermind with Golden Globe-nominated John C.

Oscar Watch: Barry Jenkins on his Lyrical Adaptation of If Beale Street Could Talk

If Beale Street Could Talk has been getting awards buzz and accolades for months, and with the Golden Globes set to arrive this Sunday, Barry Jenkins second masterpiece (in a row, no less) will be one of the night’s big winners. Still hot from his 3 Oscar wins for Moonlight, Jenkins is reaffirming he’s a major force in film, with Beale Street already winning or nominated for dozens of awards,

Director Anne Fletcher on Bringing Dumplin’ From Book to Screen

Shot outside of Atlanta over 30 days, with superstars Jennifer Aniston and Dolly Parton lending their respective acting and musical talents, director Anne Fletcher’s Dumplin’ mists your eyes and makes you laugh in equal, heartfelt measure. The independent movie, based on the YA novel of the same name, follows plus-size teenager Willowdean (Danielle Macdonald) as she signs up for her small Texas town’s beauty pageant, ostensibly to make a statement. What ensues is a life-changing experience for “Will” as well as many of her fellow contestants,

Exclusive: Anime Auteur Talks About the Child Heroes of Mirai

GKIDS has produced six Oscar-nominated animated pictures since 2015 and its latest effort, Mirai, is shaping up to be another Academy contender. Created by Japanese auteur Mamoru Hosoda for Studio Chizu, the anime feature follows adorable four-year-old Kum, who resents the arrival of his equally adorable baby sister. Time traveling adventures ensue when Kum magically meets up with a future version of his sister after she’s become a fun-loving teenager.

Writer/Director Jason Reitman & Screenwriter Jay Carson on Raising Questions in The Front Runner

Three-time Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Jason Reitman makes “discussion” movies  —  movies that prompt questions people talk about after watching.

“I don’t trust any filmmaker that says they have all the answers. I make movies because I have questions,” the writer/director told The Credits at a screening of his new film The Front Runner at the Denver Film Festival.

“All my movies have questions and they leave open-ended because I want the audience to walk out and view the rest of their life through the lens of the movie,” he said.

Ralph Breaks the Internet Co-Directors on Harnessing Disney Princess Power

Ralph Breaks the Internet goes viral in theaters Thanksgiving weekend, one of the most coveted times of the year for Hollywood releases. 2012’s Wreck-It Ralph gleaned an Oscar nomination for director Rich Moore and became a huge hit. We spoke to Moore and his co-director, Phil Johnston, who co-wrote the screenplay for Ralph Breaks the Internet with Pamela Ribon, about building a Disney sequel with both hard edges and sentimentality.

Rosamund Pike & Director Matthew Heineman on Their Riveting Biopic A Private War

A Private War is the story of the intrepid journalist Marie Colvin, who endured terrible trauma including the loss of an eye and post-traumatic stress disorder before being killed in Syria during the siege of Homs. Rosamund Pike, who plays Colvin, and director Matthew Heineman talked to The Credits about blending documentary and narrative and about Colvin’s contradictions and convictions.

Tell me about how you created the physicality Marie Colvin,