No, it wasn't a disaster...but it was disappointing. Ken and Prisca try to get at the root of what didn't work.

When reviewing a new film by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the only pertinent question is whether the frame of reference for judgment will be their other films or something broader. I have screened el...

There is an exchange between Margaret (Abby Ryder Fortson) and her mom, Barbara (Rachel McAdams) in the opening scene of Kelly Fremont Craig's adaptation of Judy Blume's novel that deviates slightly b...

Arts & Faith posted its first list of the Top 100 "Spiritually Significant" films in 2004. Originally intended as a project that could/would be updated annually, the Top 100 remained untouched between...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0lgaTezF8o For 2026, members of Arts & Faith curated a Top 25 list of spiritually significant films directed by women. The theme was one the group had talked of doing ...

YouTube video by Christian Jessup

"When you hear someone speak, it's less likely you'll want to destroy them." The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham kicks off on Thursday, April 16. Local residents and attendees who want ...

Loosely adapted from Christopher Isherwood’s Berlin Stories, Cabaret asks what individuals can do in a world gone wrong. A young British academic named Brian Roberts (Michael York) comes to Berlin in ...

The parameters of the exercise seemed simple enough: pick a favorite film from each year of my life. Progress on the series has been slow for an unexpected reason. I did not watch a lot of movies unti...

The Arts & Faith web site has announced that the theme for the 2026 Top 25 "Spiritually Significant" films list will be Women-Directed films. Deliberations are currently underway for over 100 nominate...

ALT: a man in a suit and hat is holding a guitar with the words woohoo boy above him

When a story has been adapted hundreds of times since 1910—across countless mediums—the obvious question becomes: do we really need another version? Director Guillermo del Toro answers that question w...

Prayer has been at the heart of cinema in 2026 in a way that it usually is not, from Wake-Up Dead Man to Sentimental Value to A Little Prayer. Even Superman, one could argue, as a helpless boy clings ...

It is said that a house divided against itself will not stand. In the case of Joachim Trier’s film Sentimental Value, that division is rooted in a father’s (Stellan Skarsgard) emotional and physical d...

Everything in Sinners has a twin. The protagonists, Smoke and Stack (both played by Michael B. Jordan), are twin brothers. While the characters may not resemble Cain and Abel in spirit, their fates ar...

When reviewing a new film by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the only pertinent question is whether the frame of reference for judgment will be their other films or something broader. I have screened el...

This annual Arts & Faith project enters its second decade this year, making it an apt time to summarize its purpose and methodology. The jury attempts to identify ten films released or distributed in ...

When I look at my favorite film experiences of 2025, the movies and performances that resonated with me the most powerfully, the common thread I see running through all of them is trauma. I realize th...

It's never the common elements of these stories that get to you--it's the personal, authenticating details.

YouTube video by Kenneth R. Morefield

When I first saw the trailer for The Carpenter's Son, the new film loosely based on Apocryphal Gospel of Thomas, I confess my heart sank a little. I am old enough to have lived through the furor surro...

YouTube video by Kenneth R. Morefield

Perhaps the most unfortunate thing about Culture and Anarchy, Matthew Arnold's series of essays that were later collected together as a book, is the title. No matter how many times I tell students--an...

YouTube video by Kenneth R. Morefield

The first twenty minutes of Stitch Head is just sublime. In terms of art design, story set-up, and characterization, it is on par with the better Pixar films. The titular tyke is the first creation of...

YouTube video by Kenneth R. Morefield

Blue Moon is a film so dour, so bitter, so devoid of joy or hope or spirit, that even those who praise it have trouble articulating why they are doing so. If you hop on over to the critics' reviews on...

The body-swapping conceit of Good Fortune is tired and overused, but the film's execution of it is so good that it manages to transcend the constraints of recycling a familiar premise. Arj (Aziz Ansar...

Suspended Time is the first narrative set during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in which I recognized elements of my own experience of the time. The World Health Organization reports that just over se...

Watch Kenneth Morefield and Noel Manning discuss this list and the Arts & Faith history at Meet Me at the Movies. Listen to Arts & Faith voters Lindsey Dunn, Reed Lackey, and Brian Duignan discuss fil...