Film criticism, interviews, and repertory notes
Reliability here is not a slogan. It is a short list of habits we follow from the booth to the page, and the questions readers ask us most often.
The projection format, the venue, and whether we watched a print, a file or a restoration. If a reel arrived damaged or a DCP had to be restarted, that goes in too. A note without those details is just a memory, not a record.
Transcripts are compared against the recording before they run. We cut for length and clarity, never to sharpen a quote into something the person did not say. Every contributor is credited by name at the end of the piece.
No. When we describe how a midnight marathon queue behaved or how the snack bar sold through the second film, it is a first-hand observation from a credited contributor on that night, in that room. Other screenings will differ.
We correct it in the open. The fix is dated and appended to the original text rather than quietly swapped in, so anyone who read the earlier version can see what changed and why.
Four things: confirm the venue and format, confirm contributor credit, separate what we saw from what we think about it, and flag any technical detail we could not verify on the night. If a detail stays unconfirmed, we say so in the text.
Still unsure how we handle a specific note or transcript? Read the contributor help page or send the crew a screening note.