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    Appreciation coming.  Directed by: Tim Robbins Produced by: Jon Kilik Tim Robbins Rudd Simmons Written by: Helen Prejean Tim Robbins Music by: David Robbins Cinematography by: Roger Deakins Editing by: Lisa Zeno Churgin Ray Hubley Release Date: 1995 Running Time: 122 Language: English Arts & Faith Lists: 2005 Top 100 — #15 2006 Top 100…

  • Ushpizin

    This Israeli-made film, the first collaborative effort between Israel’s religious and secular communities, is a small gem of a film. This film takes us into a world we haven’t seen before on film, inside an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Jerusalem.  Here a married couple, Moshe and Mali, are preparing for the Jewish harvest holiday of…

  • Vertigo

    From the first Arts & Faith Top 100 list in 2004, voters have wrestled with and disputed the meaning of “Spiritually Significant.” When discussing what makes a film spiritually significant, seemingly the only constant has been that it means something other that craftsmanship or artistry. Sight & Sound’s critics’ survey of the Top 100 Films of all…

  • A Moment of Innocence

    In 1974, Mohsen Makhmalbaf stabbed a young police officer while attempting to steal his gun. Makhmalbaf was only seventeen at the time but had already been actively involved for a number of years in organized resistance to the Shah’s government. He served four-and-a-half years of his sentence before being released in 1979, soon after the…

  • Embrace of the Serpent

    The third feature by Colombian director Ciro Guerra, Embrace of the Serpent calls to mind Roland Joffe’s The Mission, with its story of colonial exploitation of South American tribes.  Its brink of insanity, hallucinatory vividness is reminiscent of Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre, the Wrath of God. But Embrace of the Serpent is marvelous on its own terms.  Loosely inspired by the journals…