In what has to be a first, the prestigious Museum of Modern Art in New York is devoting considerable museum space to a working Hollywood filmmaker. Just opening this weekend is Tim Burton, a major retrospective exploring the full scale of Tim Burton’s career, both as a director and concept artist for live-action and animated films, and as an artist, illustrator, photographer, and writer. On view through April 26, 2010, the exhibition brings together over 700 examples ...
by Sandy Mandelberger, Film New York Editor
Being an independent distributor of European films in the American market is more a labour of love than it is a ticket to monied success. Among the most hard-working and celebrated of these arthouse distribution companies is Los Angeles-based Strand Releasing, which is receiving a 20th anniversary tribute next week at the prestigious Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.
MoMA is presenting a six-film showcase of recent titles fro...
The Film Department of the Museum of Modern Art is mounting a career retrospective of Mike Nichols, one of the most successful and idiosyncratic filmmakers who has done the almost impossible: create original films with a specific voice within the gears of the assembly line Hollywood system. After a celebrated career as a comedian (part of the incomporable duo of Nichols and May) and theater director, Nichols, at the tender age of 32, took on the twin dragons of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burto...
Monday, July 28-------As the summer sizzles in New York City, the sound of samba cannot be too far behind. A revival of an old tradition----dancing to live music under the stars----has swept New York in the last few seasons, with many venues and styles of music for budding Fred Astaires. A favorite for summertime heat is samba, the music of Brazil. This summer, the sizzle is not only on the street, but up on the big screen.Since last week, the Museum of Modern Art has been presenting Premiere ...
Friday, May 23-----If you are a lover of film (guilty) and also a lover of jazz (guilty again), then you are destined for movie and musical heaven at the on-going film series Jazz Score at the Museum of Modern Art. Starting last month, this unique retrospective will showcase 50 feature films and a selection of shorts that meld the power of jazz and the moving image.The series celebrates well-known and obscure jazz scores composed for films from the 1950s to the present, with a particular emph...
Wednesday, March 26----As another sign of seasonal change, the venerable New Directors/New Films festival returns to the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center in what is one of New York’s rites of Spring. Dedicated to the discovery and support of emerging artists, ND/NF has earned an international reputation for its cutting-edge programming and commitment to more artistically ambitious filmmaking. This year, a total of 26 features and 6 short films made the cut, spotlig...
Wednesday, March 19------In a bitter twist of irony, Americans know far more about the film culture of Europe and Asia than they do about their neighbor to the north. Canadian cinema, which has flourished for decades, makes an occasional dent in the United States in an unfair balance of trade that sees American films flooding the Canadian market (as they do everywhere else in the world). Well, for the past week, the Museum of Modern Art has attempted to redress this imbalance with thei...
Wednesday, January 9-------The cinema of Eastern Europe is one of the world’s most complex and rewarding for filmgoers willing to take the journey into the hearts and minds of its singular film artists. Among the most idiosyncratic of these talents is Goran Paskaljevic, one of Europe’s most respected and critically acclaimed directors. While New York audiences may have caught a few of this iconoclastic director’s choice films at film festivals over the years, the Museum of Modern Art (Mo...
Friday, November 16-------Although every Friday sees a glut of film openings making their way to film theaters, the truth is that a large number of worthy films never find traditional theatrical distribution. That is one of the reasons that the brave new worlds of internet downloads and other non-traditional distribution methods hold such promise. However, until these new methodologies take hold in such a way that they can generate the same or similar revenue, theatrical distribution remains t...
Monday, October 1---------Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke is among the most celebrated and controversial figures in the world of contemporary world cinema. His films have been divisive and disturbing affairs that leaves audiences shaken and uncertain. He holds up a mirror to a world of extreme anxiety, offensive violence and a lack of human empathy. He has inspired amazing performances from his actors, leading many to win international awards. His cinema is ferocious, compelling and unforget...
Wednesday, August 15------The title of the latest film series at the Museum of Modern Art strikes one as somehow.....wrong. THE OTHER CLAUDE CHABROL? Could there be such a thing? Chabrol is one of the most prolific and consistent French directors of the past half-century. Well into his 70s, he continues to come out with at least one film per year, and his notoreity and influence continue unabated, long after his Nouvelle Vague contemporaries have either bitten the dust or become obscured in th...
Monday, July 23-------You may think you know the film that many major film critics chose as the best of last year. But in reality, with little fanfare or certainly Oscar buzz, the film that garnered the most uniform praise from top film scribes was a French thriller, shot in 1959 and set in occupied France during World War II by a director who has been six feet under for more than three decades. That film, ARMY OF SHADOWS, directed by Jean-Pierre Melville, was an astonishingly gritty and involvi...
Monday, July 16--------As the summer turns sizzling in New York City, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is appropriately presenting a program of sultry cinema from Brazil in its fifth annual exhibition of contemporary Brazilian cinema, entitled PREMIERE BRAZIL! The program began last Thursday and continues through January 23rd in the Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters. The series is a collaboration between MoMA and the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival. This year, 12 new films, all US or New...
Wednesday, June 27--------One of the most talked about art events in New York City these days is the career retrospective of famed American sculptor Richard Serra, which is attracting capacity crowds at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). The highlights of this summer art blockbuster are three new massive sculptures that have been installed in MoMA's second floor galleries devoted to contemporary art. One of the preeminent sculptors of our era, Richard Serra has long been acclaimed for his cha...
Monday, June 18---------He still rides tall in the saddle. John Wayne, known to his friends as Duke, would have turned 100 years old this month. In celebration of the iconic actor's 100th anniversary, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is presenting the John Wayne Centenary, a six-film retrospective of selections from the Museum's film archive. The series begins on Thursday, June 20 and runs through June 30. Films will be screened in the Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters at the Museum.The serie...
Monday, June 4------The Museum of Modern Art is one of the leading forces in the world of film preservation. With one of the largest and most diverse film archives in the world, the Museum's film department has been a tireless champion of restoring and resurrecting the films and reputations of artists both well known and virtually forgotten from the early years of cinema. The Museum is celebrating its commitment to film restoration with To Save and Project, its fifth annual festival of prese...
Monday, May 7-----Rajendra Roy (known to his friends and colleagues as “Raj”) has been appointed as the Celeste Bartos Chief Curator of the Department of Film at the Museum of Modern Art, one of the most important and influential film archives in the world. Roy, who will begin his new post in July 2007, succeeds Mary Lea Bandy, who retired from the Museum in 2006.“Rajendra Roy brings to the Museum a breadth of experience that encompasses museum work as well as programming and management fo...
Friday, April 20-----The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), in association with the Indo-American Arts Council (IAAC), will present INDIA NOW, the first in what is meant to be an annual exhibition of feature and short films from a new generation of Indian filmmakers. For its inaugural year, the series will present nine new feature films and two short films, most of them New York theatrical premieres. The series, which is designed to spotlight the wide range of fiction and documentary styles and g...
Monday, April 9-------A cinema classic largely unseen since its debut in 1980 caps off the three-week series of films made by the iconoclastic German New Cinema director Rainer Werner Fassbinder that has been captivating New York audiences anew at the Museum of Modern Art. Fassbinder was the highly influential director whose distinctive films mixed politics, social issues and deep emotions in a sparkling career that was meteoric and all too brief . After the release of such 1970s milestones as F...
Thursday, March 29----With Spring (finally) making its arrival after an unexpected early March frost and series of snowstorms, one of the rites of Spring in New York is the NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS festival, which is entering its final weekend with a spring bouquet of films. The series, which is celebrating its 36th anniversary, is a joint presentation of the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Film Department of the Museum of Modern Art, with screening at both MoMA and the Film Society's ...
