Culture

We Hunted Down the 10 Best Films of 2016

From the Iranian mystery Fireworks Wednesday to the German black comedy Toni Erdmann, this year's stand-out films were far off the beaten path.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

The High Priest of the Church of Trump

How Stephen Bannon is using evangelical narratives to spread the gospel of Trumpism.

Theo Anderson

Culture

The First Hippies

The new book Rebel Crossings showcases a small band of feminist utopians who came to America to try something new.

Jane Miller

Culture

CNN’s New Book Is a Master Class in How Not to Cover an Election

The news network's instant retrospective on the Trump-Clinton race is as vacuous as their initial coverage was.

Chris Lehmann

Culture

This Christmas, Go See a German Comedy About Consulting. No, Really.

Filmmaker Maren Ade's Toni Erdmann takes a wise and whimsical look at the struggles women face in the corporate world.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

The Android Manifesto: Finding Marx in Westworld

The HBO drama is a surprisingly astute tale of alienated labor and false consciousness.

Eileen Jones

Culture

Dissident-Poet on the Lam: A New Film Captures Pablo Neruda’s Year as a Fugitive

Pablo Larrain's Neruda follows the love-poet-cum-Communist-dissident in a cat-and-mouse chase with the Chilean government.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

The Problem With Cancer Memoirs

Popular accounts ignore the underlying race and class dynamics that determine vulnerability to the disease.

Margaret Garb

Culture

Sci-Fi Iraq: Authors Envision Their Country in 2103, a Century After the U.S. Invasion

In a new collection, Iraqi writers explore their nation's future, and ridicule their former occupiers.

M. Lynx Qualey

Culture

Brexit, Trump and What We’ve Failed To Learn From the 1930s

Perhaps dark undercurrents rest beneath every society, waiting for a depression or a demagogue to unleash them.

Jane Miller

Culture

Thomas Friedman’s Latest Book Is a Tour Through His Troubled, Neoliberal Mind

We read 500 pages of corporate platitudes and ungainly metaphor so you don't have to.

Chris Lehmann

Culture

The Hairdresser of Plaistow

The happy, often glamorous life of the man who cuts my hair.

Jane Miller

Culture

A Brief History of the Right’s Racist Hate: From 1885 to Trump

The road to Trumpism is paved with scapegoats.

Theo Anderson

Culture

From Collection to Community: The Transformation of Detroit’s Iconic, 30-Year Public Art Project

The Heidelberg Project is being partly dismantled, but hopes to live on as an artistic community.

Leyland DeVito

Culture

Inside the Tax-Avoidance Racket of “Wealth Management”

A sociologist's new book reveals how the ultra-rich starve public coffers and undermine democracy.

Chris Lehmann

Culture

The Stories We Live By: Why the White Working Class Votes Conservative

In Strangers in Their Own Land, sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild travels south to study what gives conservative ideology its power.

Theo Anderson

Culture

Big Data Isn’t Just Watching You—It’s Making You Poorer

Cathy O’Neil's new book, Weapons of Math Destruction, shows mathematical models aren't free of ideology.

Pankaj Mehta

Culture

Walking While Black

Encounters with police in New York City.

Garnette Cadogan

Culture

In Ixcanul, Guatemala’s First-Ever Oscar Entry, Feminism Erupts in a Small Mayan Community

Filmed entirely in Kaqchikel, Jayro Bustamante’s new movie explores a clash between reproductive rights and tradition.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

Can There Be a Party of the Left in Britain?

Party brass may not like it, but Jeremy Corbyn's popularity could herald a new era for Labour.

Jane Miller

Culture

Werner Herzog Wants To Know: “Does the Internet Dream?”

In Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World, the septuagenarian filmmaker explores online gaming, self-driving cars and soccer-playing robots.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

James Baldwin’s Many Heirs

In the essay collection The Fire This Time, a new generation of Black writers keeps Baldwin's flame alight.

Erin Aubry Kaplan

Culture

Sim City and the Worst Ways to End Homelessness

The neoliberal mindset doesn't compute with ethical public policy.

Rebecca Burns

Culture

These Newly Restored Indie Films from Cinema’s Early Days Show Black Life From a Black Perspective

A five-disc DVD set offers a glimpse into pre-civil rights era black culture.

Michael Atkinson