Malik Bendjelloul:"Searching for Sugar Man" (2011)

Two South African music lovers embark on a mission to uncover the fate of an obscure, 1970s-era U.S. rocker whose debut album became a surprise hit in their home country, and uncover a shocking secret along the way. Sixto Diaz Rodriguez had the kind of musical career that every aspiring rock star fears -- lauded by critics but ignored by the...

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Big Star:"Third/Sister Lovers" (1978)

A shambling wreck of an album, Big Star's Third/Sister Lovers ranks among the most harrowing experiences in pop music; impassioned, erratic, and stark, it's the slow, sinking sound of a band falling apart. Recorded with their label, Stax, poised on the verge of bankruptcy, the album finds Alex Chilton at the end of his rope, sabotaging his own...

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Pavement:"Brighten the Corners" (1997)

There's a difference between accessibility and focus, which Pavement illustrate with their fourth album, Brighten the Corners. Arriving on the heels of the glorious mess of Wowee Zowee, the cohesive sound and laid-back sarcasm of Brighten the Corners can give the record the illusion of being accessible, or at the very least a retreat toward the songcraft...

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Jonas Åkerlund:"Spun" (2002)

A crystal-meth addict struggles to get his next fix as he obsesses over a recent breakup in Spun, a black-comic drug drama from music video director Jonas Akerlund. Rushmore's Jason Schwartzman stars as Ross, a young man who finds his maniacal world crumbling around him over the course of one long weekend. Spun chronicles Ross' travails as he tries...

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Gordon Parks:"Shaft" (1971)

Richard Roundtree cuts a startlingly new and powerful heroic figure as John Shaft, "the cat who won't cop out, when there's danger all about" in Gordon Parks' seminal action film, Shaft. John Shaft is a black private eye with a small office near Times Square. On his way there one day, he gets pumped for information by Lt. Victor Androzzi (Charles...

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Isaac Hayes:"Hot Buttered Soul" (1969)

Released at the tail end of the '60s, Hot Buttered Soul set the precedent for how soul would evolve in the early '70s, simultaneously establishing Isaac Hayes and the Bar-Kays as major forces within black music. Though not quite as definitive as Black Moses or as well-known as Shaft, Hot Buttered Soul remains an undeniably seminal record; it stretched...

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Girls Season 2 review

Hannah Horvath is getting her act together. If she can.   Hannah, the twentysomething heroine of “Girls” (played by the show’s creator, writer and director Lena Dunham) spent much of the HBO comedy’s first season alienating every person in her life — including many of the viewers who didn’t see the appeal of a show built around a...

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David Fincher:"Fight Club" (1999)

In this darkly comic drama, Edward Norton stars as a depressed young man (named in the credits only as "Narrator") who has become a small cog in the world of big business. He doesn't like his work and gets no sense of reward from it, attempting instead to drown his sorrows by putting together the "perfect" apartment. He can't sleep and feels...

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The Slits:"Cut" (1979)

Almost as well-known for its cover (the three Slits are half-naked and covered in mud) as for its music, Cut is an ebullient piece of post-punk mastery that finds the Slits' interest in Caribbean and African rhythms smoothly incorporated into their harsher punk rock stylings. Ari Up's wandering voice (a touch like Yoko Ono) might be initially off-putting,...

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Alfred Hitchcock:"North by Northwest" (1959)

While having lunch at the Plaza Hotel, advertising executive Roger O. Thornhill (Cary Grant) has the bad luck to stand up just as a "George Kaplan" is being paged. From this point on, Thornhill's life is turned upside down. He is abducted by three mysterious men and whisked away to the palatial home of enemy spy Phillip Vandamm (James Mason). ...

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The Pogues:"Rum Sodomy & the Lash" (1985)

"I saw my task... was to capture them in their delapidated glory before some more professional producer f--ked them up," Elvis Costello wrote of his role behind the controls for the Pogues' second album, Rum Sodomy & the Lash. One spin of the album proves that Costello accomplished his mission; this album captures all the sweat, fire, and angry...

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Quentin Tarantino:"Django Unchained" (2012)

A former slave and a German bounty hunter become unlikely allies in the battle against a tyrannical plantation owner in this western from visionary director Quentin Tarantino. Two years before the Civil War pits brother-against-brother, German-born fugitive hunter Dr. King Schultz (Academy Award-winner Christoph Waltz) arrives in America determined...

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The xx :"Coexist" (2012)

In the years between their debut and Coexist, the xx's sound took on a life of its own, thanks in large part to Drake's hit duet with Rihanna, "Take Care," which sampled Jamie Smith's collaboration with Gil Scott Heron, We're New Here. That single embodied and popularized the xx's aesthetic to such a degree that on first listen, Coexist can sound...

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