"I pick films that are worth a serious look by a serious crowd into having some serious fun." 
- Harlan Jacobson, Founder, Talk Cinema

HARLAN JACOBSON has covered principally the changing film industry first as a young staffwriter and critic for VARIETY, later as the editor of FILM COMMENT for a decade. 

For Variety, he covered the U.S. Antitrust implications of film distribution and exhibition in the 1970s, reviewed dozens of films pre-release, foresaw the Superhero film rise with the first Superman, and bowed out with a front-page banner headline on the color-fading of film stock that threatened the nation’s film heritage (“Old Films Never Die, They Just Fade Away”). 

At Film Comment, Jacobson’s cover story interview with Michael Moore ("Michael & Me") for the film Roger & Me, sparked the U.S. and European press to debate Moore's misrepresentations of fact in the film, and was widely cited (The New Yorker, The NY Times, and dozens of print and network broadcast organizations) for causing a media rethink of the film and a re-examination of its suitability as an Oscar nomination. It is often assigned reading in journalism schools around the US. 

His "Brief Encounters" interview column as Contributing Editor ran for 20 years in Film Comment and included such subjects as Francis Ford Coppola, Julianne Moore, Paul Giamatti, Steve Buscemi, The Coens and Scott Rudin, Frederick Wiseman, Anthony Hopkins, Ridley Scott, Larry David, Sean Penn, Jason Reitman, Mike Leigh, Timothy Spall, Peter Morgan, Robert Duvall, Tilda Swinton, Richard Jenkins, Abbas Kiarostami, Werner Herzog, Ken Loach, Nanni Moretti, Sir Ben Kingsley, Robert Zemeckis and more.

Jacobson for 40 years was also a regular outside correspondent for major news media worldwide on film and pop culture. That included extensive coverage of independent film and international festivals from Cannes to Berlin, Havana, Toronto, Telluride and Sundance for major American and European print and broadcast media, such as Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, CNN, NPR, the CBC and particularly USA Today, where for 20 years he regularly contributed from around the US and world on new films at their debut.  

Named film critic in 2010 for WBGO (www.wbgo.org, Jazz Radio 88.3 FM in Newark, NJ), Jacobson covers the international film scene for “The WBGO Journal,” with reports from film festivals around the world about films arriving on the scene in the greater New York metroplex. 

Jacobson was the film critic for WFUV 90.7 FM Public Radio in New York for 15 years and served as the Artistic Director of the PHILADELPHIA FILM FESTIVAL.

A native of Toledo, Ohio, Jacobson lives in Croton on Hudson, NY. He’s a member of the BROADCAST FILM CRITICS ASSN. (Critics Choice Assn.), FIPRESCI (International Film Critics Assn) and PEN. Following high school at Maumee Valley Country Day School in Maumee, Ohio, he graduated with Honors from Haverford College. 

TALK CINEMA
The most satisfying aspect of Jacobson’s career has been the 30-plus years with partner Susan Jacobson that they have mounted TALK CINEMA (www.talkcinema.com), a sneak screening and critic-led discussion series on critically important new films before they are released theatrically to the public, before media campaigns are set in motion, before the consumer press has shaped perception of the film.  

Formerly at Lincoln Center in New York and more than a dozen locations around the US., Talk Cinema now screens films at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute in Bryn Mawr PA, the Speed Museum in Louisville, and as pop-up screenings at theatres in New York City. 

The TALK CINEMA audience is comprised of informed and connected opinion-makers in their respective communities who tend not to go to film festivals but have selected a series curated by Harlan Jacobson, the nationally recognized film critic whose signature guarantees quality selections from Cannes, Sundance, Toronto, Telluride, and other internationally ranked film festivals.

Talk Cinema audiences have often been the first in their cities to see new cinema, including from the archives, The Crying Game, Pulp Fiction, Fargo, Y Tu Mama Tambien, Being John Malkovich, Girl With The Pearl Earring, The Dragon Tattoo, Slumdog Millionaire, Borat, The Artist, Blue is the Warmest Color, Once, The Lives of Others, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Kite Runner, Secrets & Lies, Wag the Dog, The Ice Storm, LA Confidential, The Big Lebowski, The Apostle, The American President, Memento, Cider House Rules, Brokeback Mountain, Erin Brockovich, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Billy Elliott, Winter’s Bone, Silver Linings Playbook, Sideways, Bend It Like Beckham, 12 Monkeys, Rabbit Proof Fence, Nebraska, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, In the Mood for Love, Shall We Dance, Irma Vep, Locke, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Lunchbox, Le Weekend, You Can Count on Me, Ida, Eye in the Sky, Summer Hours, Dheepan, Incendies, Antonia’s Line, Venus, Cadillac Records, Gomorrah, Hamsun, The Band’s Visit, My Name Is Joe, Joe Gould’s Secret, The Big Kahuna, The Pope’s Toilet, Don’t Think Twice, Tsotsi, Moonlight, Time Out, The Son’s Room, All About My Mother, Elizabeth, The Last Station, The White Balloon, An Inconvenient Truth, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, Super Size Me, 20 Feet From Stardom, Man on Wire, Fast Cheap and Out of Control, When We Were Kings, A Man Called Ove, Waking Ned Devine, Kitchen Stories, Toni Erdmann, Waiting for Guffman, Things We Lost in the Fire, The Harmonists, Life Is Beautiful, Family Resemblances, Amelie, Topsy Turvy, Bread and Tulips, Under the Sand, Shine, I Daniel Blake, An Education, I Am Not Your Negro, Dancer in the Dark, Girlfight, Before Night Falls, Gods and Monsters, Force Majeure, Melancholia, Beau Travail, Gosford Park, Rosetta, The Saddest Music in the World, Russian Ark, Pleasantville, No Man’s Land, The Singing Detective, The Cooler, The English Patient, Citizen Ruth, Four Months Three Weeks and Two Days, Downfall, Two Lovers, Juno, Rachel Getting Married, The Sweet Hereafter, The Square, The Angel’s Share, Matchpoint, The Reader, Frances Ha, The Squid and the Whale, Chungking Express, Kinky Boots, 20th Century Women, Lady Bird, I Tonya, A Fantastic Woman, Borg/McEnroe, The Rider, Starlet, The Florida Project, Stan & Ollie, The Straight Story, The Two Popes, Blue Is the Warmest Color, Pain & Glory, Clemency, Portrait of A Lady On Fire, Old Henry, Brighton 4th, C’mon C’mon, The Good Boss, The Worst Person in the World, Armageddon Time, Living, The Taste of Things. The list goes on forever. 

TALK CINEMA TRAVELS
For over 30 years, Talk Cinema has mounted cultural and international film festival tours, taking Talk Cinema Travelers to explore exciting destination cities. Our curated experiences include Spain (San Sebastian), Morocco (Marrakesh), The Netherlands (Amsterdam IDFA), Iceland (Reykjavik), Cuba (Havana), Colombia (Cartagena), Cannes, Sundance, Toronto, Palm Springs, Miami, Montreal, Vancouver, Italy (Taormina) India (Kerala), Israel (Jerusalem),  Switzerland (Locarno), and Avignon among others.

A cultural immersion is the organizing principle of each tour, giving Talk Cinema Travelers access to festival screenings and panels, plus discussions with filmmakers, artists, chefs, and subject matter experts. Add in authentic cuisine and stand-out galleries and museums as we explore some of the most fascinating and hospitable destinations around the world, Talk Cinema Travelers have enjoyed hands-on, personally curated, and hosted cultural getaways. Travel with us and see!