Relationships

TV critic David Bianculli reviews Mad Men, the drama about advertising execs during the Kennedy years. Season two of the Emmy-nominated series begins on Sunday night on AMC.

On Sept. 21, the AMC series Mad Men became the first basic cable program to win an Emmy Award for outstanding drama. Executive producer Matthew Weiner and actors Jon Hamm and John Slattery discuss the madness of Madison Avenue circa 1960.

The Wrestler is predictable, corny and heavy-handed, says critic David Edelstein, but with Mickey Rourke acting his heart out, the sheer adrenaline-pumping violence of the film gets into your bloodstream.

Academy Award-winning writer and director Woody Allen discusses his life and his films — and why audiences shouldn't confuse the two. His latest movie, Whatever Works, tells the story of a "genius" professor in New York who marries a much younger woman.

When it came out in 1961, Alain Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad perplexed and excited audiences with its surrealistic storytelling. John Powers has a review of the film's Criterion Collection re-release.

Author and screenwriter Nick Hornby joins Fresh Air host Terry Gross to discuss his new novel, Juliet, Naked, and his screenplay for the new movie An Education.

The seventh season finale of Curb Your Enthusiasm capped a year-long storyline about Larry finally agreeing to a produce a reunion episode of Seinfeld when he co-created with Jerry Seinfeld. TV critic David Bianculli explains how both programs -- the show and the show within the show -- were a comedic cop and a perfect end to the season.

Martin Scorcese said of Sam Fuller's work, "If you don't like the films of Sam Fuller, then you just don't like cinema." The maverick screenwriter and director died in 1997, but a new 7-disc selection of his work embodies what's most enjoyable and enduring about pulp fiction.

Noah Baumbach's movie stars Ben Stiller as a 40-ish unemployed carpenter searching for meaning in his life. After seeing the film, critic David Edelstein wonders if there's a limit "to how self-centered, how small you can make a character before you're punishing the audience."

Tilda Swinton stars as a wealthy wife and mother who gets involved with a younger man in Luca Guadagnino's acclaimed new film I Am Love. Fresh Air's critic-at-large John Powers says the movie offers grownup audiences something they've been missing.

Marilyn Mmiller was one of the most adored and charismatic Broadway musical stars of the 1920s and '30s. She also had a brief movie career -- before her death in 1936, at the age of 37. Critic Lloyd Schwartz review two of her movies, Sally and Sunny, just released on DVD.

Lincoln, the jazz legend who transformed herself from a supper-club singer into a powerful voice in the civil-rights movement, died Saturday. She was 80. Fresh Air revisits two interviews with the respected performer, actress and songwriter.

Portions of this interview were originally broadcast on March 25, 1986, and June 16, 1996.

The winner of the inaugural Queer Palm at Cannes, Gregg Araki's Kaboom is a freewheeling apocalyptic comedy centered around a sexually curious college freshman. Critic David Edelstein says the exhilarating movie is "part Blake Edwards, part David Lynch."

The Farrelly brothers' latest comedy stars Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis as sexually frustrated men given a week off from marriage by their spouses. Movie critic David Edelstein says the movie's premise — while creepy — leaves viewers "with a sad and wise view of adulthood."

Suze Rotolo, who strongly influenced Bob Dylan's songwriting and walked beside him on the album cover for The Freewheeling Bob Dylan, died of lung cancer on Friday. She was 67. Fresh Air remembers Dylan's muse with excerpts from a 2008 interview.

Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami's Certified Copy appears to tell a simple story -- two people, played by Juliette Binoche and William Shimell, are mistaken for a long-married couple. But there are plot twists that will "ping-pong around your mind for days," says critic David Edelstein.

How bad is this teacher? Director Jake Kasdan stuffs ineptness and inappropriateness into the lesson plan in equal measure. But critic David Edelstein says that the film's moral turpitude is also the source of its charm.

Jeffrey Eugenides' third novel, The Marriage Plot, charts the lives of three young adults as they finish college, fall in love and navigate the real world after graduating from Brown University in 1982. Eugenides, also a Brown alum, based some of the novel on his own experiences directly after college.

If you've seen the trailers-- or the cover of Entertainment Weekly -- you know the new romantic comedy is selling sex along with the laughs. But the "state-of-the-art zeitgeist sex comedy" also manages to deliver some strong satirical undertones.

In Friends with Kids, Adam Scott and Jennifer Westfeldt play two best friends who decide to have a baby together while keeping their relationship platonic -- so the baby doesn't interfere with their romantic lives. Critic David Edelstein say the film is simply marvelous.