Hugo Emmerzael

Hugo Emmerzael is a film critic, curator and public speaker based in Amsterdam. He’s a member of Golden Globes and FIPRESCI, Deputy Digital Editor of Locarno’s Pardo magazine, and an editor of independent Dutch film publication Filmkrant. Bylines include MUBI Notebook, Filmmaker Magazine, Documentary Magazine and Little White Lies. Hugo is a celebrated public speaker, with extensive experience in moderation work, introductions, lectures and masterclasses for renowned film festivals and cultural institutions.

On Celebrating Cinema, Hugo runs the director deep dives — the format the show takes most seriously, and the one where his Sight & Sound register earns its keep. The Akerman, Wenders, Ramsay and Yang arcs are his. The long-form film essays that land behind the Substack paywall from August 2026 onwards are his too. The arrangement, in practice, is that Hugo writes the piece the show couldn’t finish on the night.

His critical lane is contemporary cinema and the discourse around it — including, with some affection, musical biopics. The arguments he tends to win on the show are the ones where the press cycle and the actual film are doing two different things, and he is the host most likely to name the difference out loud.

He approaches the show the way he approaches a Filmkrant column — with research, a position, and the willingness to be wrong out loud.

He writes the weekly Lead in the Celebrating Cinema Substack on episodes he anchors, rotates through the show’s Hot Take column once every five weeks, and is the source for most of the show’s Letterboxd recommendations on contemporary world cinema. His Letterboxd, linked above, is one of the more dangerous ones to read late at night.

If you’re new to the show, his deep dive on [TBD: pick a strong Hugo episode] is the standard recommendation.