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Film

Explore Madison’s art-house screenings and the adventurous corners of local cinema.

An old black-and-white photograph from the mid-late 1960s of a young man sitting at a desk in a room. He turns his gaze towards the camera and stares with a neutral expression. The photo is altered with black digital debris that litters the image and emulates mental noise.

Three video artists tap into personal histories in the 150 Artists x 150 Years exhibition

Chele Isaac, Toby Kaufmann-Buhler, and Aaron Granat reveal the creative depths of their works, which are on display through February 28 at Central Library.

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Latest in Film
Medium close-up video still of two people sitting at a table in a conference room. They are turned towards one another and engaged in conversation. The person on the left wears a dark blue polo shirt and makes a gesture with his left hand while he speaks. The person on the right smiles slightly, wearing a black Lychgate band shirt and black Kangol cap. He listens with his eyes angled down.
Video: Sizing up local screening events and prominent performances of 2025

A chat with Josiah Wampfler at OCA Media about our favorite movie-going experiences and acting roles of last year.

A simple image collage that is split in a vertical orientation. The left image shows a poster light box for Luc Besson's "Dracula" that features the AMC logo in white text on a red-bar background at the top. The surrounding wall is painted a golden-brown color. The right image shows the poster for Brett Ratner's "Melania" in a similar light box. The wall surrounding the poster is painted black.
Stop spotlighting new films by known abusers

Madison boasts a dynamic movie culture, yet still needs programmers and community voices to facilitate change.

A still frame from the film "Resurrection" (2025) shows a corner stage area bathed in a French navy blue-grey light. The stage is littered with oversized props (some covered by white sheets) that recall the films of Georges Méliès from the late 19th and early 20th century—including a crescent moon with a face and a fireplace with a black curtain that is partly pulled back to reveal a starry and cloudy sky. A female actor wears a traditional Chinese dress and looks off to the left in the foreground.
“Resurrection” explores human perceptions through the historical labyrinth of cinema

Bi Gan's latest art-house epic premieres locally at UW Cinematheque on February 5.

Simple rectangular image collage of four film stills. At the top left, teenager Willa (Chase Infiniti) practices shooting an assault rifle in an open field in "One Battle After Another." At the top right, thirtysomething parent J.B. Mooney (Josh O'Connor) scopes out the Framingham Art Museum before he plans a robbery in "The Mastermind." At the bottom left, teenager Kyle (Jackson Sluiter) skates through the suburbs of Calgary in Alberta, Canada. At the bottom right, frazzled mother Linda (Rose Byrne) stops for a moment at her motel after visiting the convenience store in "If I Had Legs I'd Kick You."
One movie meditation after another: toiling through 2025

Nine writers processed these trying times through cinema, at the theaters and at home.

A still taken from Nicholas R. Wootton's experimental short "Liking This Angle" shows a woman holding up a plaster mold of a human arm on an angled wooden structure in an art studio. A second image of water streaking down a windshield is superimposed over it.
“Liking This Angle” finds artistic inspiration in degrees of the edit

Nicholas R. Wootton's experimental short, featuring sculptor Christina A. West, premieres at Art Lit Lab as part of Project Projection on January 21.

In a spacious and opulent house, two sisters stand at a medium shot in a sunlit room and look out to the right (through an unseen window). Both women have dark brown hair that is pulled back. They also both wear comfortable, long-sleeve clothing.
Evaluating tenderness and depth of family dynamics in “Sentimental Value”

Grant Phipps and Lance Li argue in favor of and against the artistic framework of Joachim Trier's latest psychological family drama.

A photograph shows a medium close-up of different sizes of two t-shirt designs hanging on a clothing rack. The leftmost one is "Blade Runner" and the rightmost one is "The Thing." The "Blade Runner" tee prominently features Deckard's face (Harrison Ford) as well as text from the film in yellow and white, while "The Thing" tee includes small portraits of the cast arranged in two long rows with blue text and the iconic alien monster design rendered in black and white.
Movie tee envy

Pondering a shirt collection, and stumbling upon Cosmic Cabin, which has the goods—at least niche ones for cinephiles.

Still image from the film "The Annihilation Of Fish" shows a rainy park scene in Los Angeles with geese along the grass and paved trail. A man in a tuxedo and black trenchcoat carries a black umbrella in the foreground. His facial expression appears pensive and perhaps a bit upset. In the middleground, a woman in a blue floral dress and red and orange floral umbrella stands still and looks at him with a sense of sympathy and concern.
“The Annihilation Of Fish” wholeheartedly renders the enchanting eccentricities of a senior romance

Charles Burnett's long-lost love story from 1999 screens on 35mm at UW Cinematheque on December 5.

A rectangular graphic to promote the Black Film Festival in Madison shows several different images with thin black border outlines in each corner. These include a poster for the narrative film "Miss Juneteenth" in the upper left and archival black-and-white photos from the documentary film "Fresh Dressed" in the upper right above the festival text and logos for both Madison Public Library and Justified Anger: Courses. The lower part of the image contains images from video essays—a Black couple sitting in a living room (at the bottom left) and Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl Halftime performance (at the bottom right)—that are included as part of the festival.
In its third year, the Black Film Festival commits to deeper regional representation

The Nehemiah Center and Justified Anger partner with Madison Public Library to honor Black lives and culture November 12 through 15.