Departures of note

Ann Hornaday was an American film critic who spent more than two decades at The Washington Post, joining the paper in 2002 and leaving in 2025. In 2008 she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, cited for her perceptive movie reviews and essays reflecting solid research and an easy, engaging style. Born in Iowa City, Iowa, she graduated from Smith College in 1982 and began her career as a freelance writer in New York, contributing to Premiere, Us and Ms. magazines, where she also worked as an assistant to Gloria Steinem. She became film critic at the Austin American-Statesman in 1995, moved to The Baltimore Sun in 1997, and joined the Post following the retirement of its previous critic. In 2017 she published Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies, a widely praised primer on the crafts of filmmaking aimed at general audiences. Before her death she completed a book about the making of the 1976 film All the President's Men. She died from glioblastoma at her home in Baltimore on October 18, 2026, at the age of 66.