Ken Russell's The Devils Returns as Lit Hub Staffers Pick the Week's Best

A new 4K restoration of Ken Russell's The Devils is screening across arthouses this week, and it tops the culture recommendations from the Literary Hub masthead. Staffer Brittany Allen caught the buzzy restoration Monday afternoon at the IFC Center in New York.

Allen describes Russell's film as a hyper-theatrical allegory based on an Aldous Huxley book. The film, censored in England and the United States, depicts a sex-crazed convent, a highly amoral Catholicism, and—as Allen puts it—"the OG hot priest."

The new print, she writes, honors what is sacred and profane in the lush epic, from Derek Jarman's spiraling sets to Vanessa Redgrave's "disturbed shoulder acting." Her verdict: an experience hard to capture in print, and one readers should see in a theater for themselves.

What else is on the staff's radar?

Comics take over Williamsburg. Oliver Scialdone is heading to the Brooklyn Expo of Comics, a free public celebration running this weekend in Williamsburg. Speakers include illustrator royalty: Chris Ware, Lisa Hannawalt, and Wendy Xu. For Scialdone, the event matters as a successor to the late, great Comic Arts Brooklyn—though he failed to secure tickets for a fireside chat with Caroline Cash and Alison Bechdel.

A 52nd birthday for Texas co-op living. Down South, CrimeReads editor Molly Odintz is skipping the Texas Book Fest this weekend to attend the 21st Street Co-op's 52nd birthday party. Odintz is a former resident of the first cooperative housing in North America to be purpose-built as a co-op. She writes that she is hyped to celebrate collective living, especially at a moment that has seen strong communal vibes in Texas.

A spy thriller for the season. Podcasts editor Drew Broussard is riding the high of Black Doves, the new spy thriller on Netflix, drizzled with political intrigue. Broussard, who "forgot how much [he] enjoy[s] Keira Knightley as an actress," singles out Ben Whishaw's long gazes and the show's holiday-friendly vibe.

"I'm into it like I'm into my cozy sweaters," Broussard says. "Which is to say: very much so, right now."

What is Habibi Funk resurrecting now?

James Folta, the staffer behind the Literary Bracket that readers should have filled out by now, is spinning records this week. His source: Habibi Funk, the Berlin-based label and deejay outfit that digs through crates to reissue lost gems from the Arab music world.

Folta has been working through the label's archive. The standout so far is the compilation Beirut City Pop, ten tracks drawn from Lebanon's "private press cassette scene of the late 1970s and 1980s"—all excellent, in his judgment.

Two tracks lead the pack. Folta says he has been "especially drawn in by the delicate longing in 'You Turn Me On,' and 'Someday,' which has a killer main riff and a warbling synth solo about two minutes in."

The week's picks share one thread: rediscovery. A censored 1971-era epic returns to screens in a faithful new print, a defunct comics fair finds an heir in Williamsburg, and forgotten Lebanese cassettes reach new listeners through a Berlin reissue label—proof that the archive, on screen or on wax, keeps paying out.