Menu
© 2026 The Couch Critic
Browse 93 movies from Columbia University School of the Arts
Short tale about the violent impulses of the young, gaybashing, and losing control.
Apr 1993
Anna is in NY writing roach killer commercials while being infatuated with Marta a Barcelona based actress. Anna decides to get out of the closet and she does it to non other than to Marta's partner.
Jan 1991
"A-Alike" is the story of two brothers from opposite sides of the social spectrum.
Dec 2003
Comedy concerning a young writer who places an ad in the personals section of the newspaper and gets a response.
Jan 1982
Shame and embarrassment propel Savannah, a gifted high school student, embarks on a journey through space and time to witness the prison convictions of her great-grandmother Etta Mae, her grand-aunt Olive, and her aunt Denise. The fanciful and chilling tales of a delightfully vain maid in the 1920s, a hopelessly depressed nanny in the 1950s, and a mother frustrated during the holiday season in the 1980s, help Savannah reconcile her feelings about her own past in this touching coming-of-age story. An imaginative, thoroughly engaging drama that speaks volumes about identity and self-worth.
Jun 1998
During a ride on the Staten Island Ferry, a young Wall Street investment banker and an old shoeshine man begin chatting and discussing their life philosophies.
Jan 1987
An avant garde prison power struggle as witnessed through the point of view of the inmates’ only television set with the biggest troublemaker and sweetest seducer on the cellblock. The Knicks have just taken the Bulls to overtime, but it’s time for Star Trek. The film took two days to shoot, one week to edit, and one year to create the special effects. With it being Shot on 16mm film and transferred to video and then edited on a computer - the first student film at Columbia to be edited digitally.
Jan 1997
Based on the short story from Ernest Hemingway. It is 1915, in a mountain forest of the American Northeast. Young Nick Adams follows his father across lake Minnewaska, to an Indian Camp. Here, Nick learns that his father will try to help an Iroquois woman deliver a difficult birth.
May 1990
An mad, unhinged chef and his futile attempts at killing a cockroach in a restaurant kitchen. This film takes its cues from the giant-insect films of the 50's such as "Them!" (1954) and a nod in the direction of Kafka's "Metamorphosis."
Dec 1989
A concert pianist falls in love with himself in this modern retelling of the Narcissus myth.
May 1994
A film styled in the form of a silent film about a Chinese laundryman in turn-of-the-century New York who longs to return to his homeland, uses subtitles.
Apr 1991
An experimental contemporary twist on Romeo and Juliet in which time runs out for two star-crossed lovers from different worlds that are caught amidst a world war in which one lover always lives and the other always dies
Starring the Academy Award-winning actor F. Murray Abraham, shot in high-definition video, and was transferred to 35mm film. Portrays a performance artist, Jack Narwhal, who cut himself into pieces for display in major museums around the world. In this film, he explains his bodiless condition to a belligerent workman who is setting up another exhibit in the gallery.
Apr 1990
The narrative unfolds as a timid young man, Cal, arrives for a date at the penthouse of June whose house resembles a whimsical modern art installation almost like Pee-Wee's Playhouse. He offers her roses, only to have them immediately rejected. What follows is a series of absurd, slapstick-inspired events—breaking a decorative bust, accidentally putting a fish in the June’s drink—that culminate in Cal posing shirtless on her indoor “beach” set, sparking June's creative epiphany and leading her to photograph him for a Vogue ad campaign. This short film was created in 1987 under the mentorship of Martin Scorsese while Gruber was a student at Columbia Film School, and has since earned a place in exhibitions at New York’s MoMA, cementing its status as a noteworthy artistic work.
Jan 1988
Jean-Pierre, a French jerk living in New York, is in desperate need of money. His friend Barry, a wealthy American, is coming to dinner. But is Jean Pierre any match for Barry since he proposes a bet? Because if Jean-Pierre wins, he gets the money. If he loses, Barry sleeps and has sex with Jean-Pierre's wife.
Jan 1985
Playing hooky from school, Tony, a student/chorister at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, spends the afternoon at Central Park's Sailboat lake and retrieves a remote control device left behind by a pair of sailboat racers. Back in the schoolyard, Tony pretends that he has a car to go with the remote control. When another boy tries to take the control from him, it falls on the ground and a red remote-control sports car miraculously appears. The car "dances" to rap music and even brings Tony a can of soda. One day, a sinister-looking man with a briefcase steals the car and flees into the subway. Tony and his classmates pursue the thief to the Wall Street area and ask to inspect the briefcases of passing businessmen. Eluding the students, the crook hails a taxi and hurls the briefcase from the window. Next morning, Tony hears the sound of a sports car during a church service. Returning to its rightful owner, the magical car mysteriously reappears at the end of the processional.
Jun 1990
Shows the perils of Mauricio Montoya’s passion for a fading opera singer.
A comedy set in a surreal school about a professor who lectures about Buddhism -- an ancient religion, and karma -- the law of cause and effect. He rambles on while becoming increasingly annoyed by a fly he attempts to squash, helping the class learn a valuable lesson about "karma express".
Jun 1989
Based on the comic strip character by the same name. This comedy revolves around a dying millionaire tries to announce his heir to his greedy relatives, as well his mistress and his accountant. All are arguing amongst themselves, as they want to be chosen as his heir, knowing that the problem is that if he dies before picking one of them, all of his fortune goes to a bird-watching club. Then Politenessman interrupts and uses his steel hanky towards the millionaire, killing him, and to reprimand everyone for whispering, deeming it impolite and a sign of "bad breeding". As a result of the millionaire's death, unable to announce an heir and leaving all of his fortune to the bird-watching club. Politenessman reminds the viewers that while not everyone can be a millionaire, it costs very little to be courteous.
Jewish family history is reconstructed in this documentary about the traces of German terror in Eastern Europe during World War II where in which is about the attic of a peasant's home where her family's parents and relatives hid in squalor during the war for two frightening years hid, and then spent most of their lives afterwards trying to forget what happened. Yet their children somehow knew what their parents went through. Deciding to confront her personal demons, Goodstein went back to Poland with her aunt and a group of cousins to meet the woman who sheltered her family.
Dec 1988