The Library at MAF Presents: A.S. Hamrah in Conversation with Carlos Valladares

• March 24, 2026 | 7 PM - 8 PM

On the evening of Tuesday, March 24, 2026, the Library at MAF is pleased to present film critic A.S. Hamrah and curator Carlos Valladares in conversation to discuss Hamrah’s two recently published books — Last Week in End Times Cinema and Algorithm of the Night — along with the current state of cinema and more.

Last Week in End Times Cinema, published on November 25, 2025 by Semiotext(e), is a collection of 52 weekly email digests published between March 2024 and March 2025. According to n+1, a triannual print and digital magazine of literature, culture and politics to which Hamrah is a contributor, Last Week in End Times Cinema collates “the worst, most inane, most apocalyptic reports from Hollywood — chronicling exactly one year of an industry in decline — from AI bluster to the ominous stupidity of Warner Bros. head David Zaslav.” 

Algorithm of the Night, published December 2, 2025 by n+1, is a collection of film essays and aphoristic reviews by A. S. Hamrah, spanning from 2019-2025, that covers the Trump and Covid years, analyzing the film industry’s crisis and cultural shifts through sharp, witty and politically-aware criticism.

Limited copies of each of Hamrah’s latest books will be available for purchase courtesy of Book Soup.

Special thanks to Semiotext(e), n+1 magazine, Now Instant Image Hall and Book Soup for their support on this event.

Please note: all upstairs galleries will be closed at the time of event. BRUCE CONNER / RECORDING ANGEL will be on view in the Theater Gallery until 6:50 p.m., so please feel free to come early and enjoy the exhibition.

Event details:
6:30 p.m.: Doors and parking (located on Lucerne Blvd)
7 p.m.: Event begins

This event is now at capacity.

A. S. Hamrah is the author of The Earth Dies Streaming: Film Writing, 2002-2018. He is the film critic for n+1 and writes for a number of other publications, including Harper’s, Bookforum, The Nation, The New York Review of Books, Fast Company, The Baffler, and the Criterion Collection. He has worked as a movie theater projectionist, a semiotic brand analyst in the television industry, a political pollster, a football cinematographer, and for the film director Raúl Ruiz. He produced the feature-length documentary Bunker, directed by Jenny Perlin, which was the opening night film at the Museum of Modern Art’s Doc Fortnight in 2022. He lives in New York.

Carlos Valladares is a writer, critic, curator, and film programmer. He studied film and art history at Stanford and Yale University. He has written for Gagosian Quarterly, Art in America, Brooklyn Rail, n+1, and the San Francisco Chronicle, among others. He is currently developing his first feature films, a political thriller and a romantic comedy.