Rachel Kushner’s Adventures in Moviegoing

With her latest novel, "Creation Lake," hitting shelves this September, acclaimed writer Rachel Kushner—whose "The Flamethrowers" was recently named one of the best 100 books of the twenty-first century by the New York Times—sits down with Criterion Channel curator Aliza Ma to discuss her long-standing fascination with film and the ways in which cinema has influenced her own art. Reflecting on her favorite movies made in her onetime home of San Francisco, why Michelangelo Antonioni is always with her, and why she considers Barbara Loden’s WANDA to be the greatest film ever made about the United States, Kushner offers astute cultural insight into the filmgoing experience and the alchemical relationship between the cinematic image and the printed word.