FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER OFFERS

FREE SCREENINGS AND EVENTS FOR THE PUBLIC

TO CELEBRATE OPENING OF

NEW FILM CENTER

JUNE 10-12

 

Highlights include a movie marathon of NYFF classics and appearances by Kevin Smith, Jason Reitman, Mike Nichols, Oliver Stone, Paul Schrader and Fredric Jameson, among others

New York, NY, May 16, 2011 – The Film Society of Lincoln Center, America’s pre-eminent New York-based non-profit film organization, announced today that its new landmark state-of-the-art Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center — a multi-screen theater and cultural venue in the heart of Lincoln Center’s campus — will offer the general public a weekend of free programming, in and around the Film Center, leading up to the official opening on June 17. 

Events celebrating the film center’s opening and previewing the programming to come will include special screenings, music performances and discussions on film by top filmmakers, luminaries and academics. Highlights will include a movie marathon of NY Film Festival classics such as MILLER’S CROSSING, MY FAIR LADY and PULP FICTION; new restorations from the Cinematheque Francaise and the Hong Kong Film Archive; a performance by the band Fall On Your Sword, which caused a sensation at the recent Sundance Film Festival; and film discussions, panels and Q&As with notable figures that include Paul Schrader, Antonio Damasio, and Fredric Jameson (the noted cultural critic and winner of the 2008 Holberg International Memorial Prize).

Additional confirmed highlights will be Jason Reitman and Mike Nichols discussing Nichols’ classic CARNAL KNOWLEDGE following a screening of the film, Oliver Stone appearing with a special director’s cut of ALEXANDER REVISITED, PAUL SCHRADER conducting a “film class” with Bernardo Bertolucci’s classic THE CONFORMIST as the subject, and Kevin Smith presenting a special nostalgic look at Martha Coolidge’s 1983 comedy VALLEY GIRL. The event will mark the debut of a new bi-monthly FSLC screening series, “Kevin Smith’s SMoviola.”

Among the events designed to showcase the Film Center’s brand new Amphitheatre will be “Merv Bloch’s Trailer Show” which will feature the film industry’s advertising legend and the creative force behind many of the iconic movie trailers of the 60s, 70s and 80s, and screenings of THE STORY and LIVE, JOSEPH!, from Ghetto Film School, the award-winning film education program in the South Bronx which works to develop a new generation of film artists from that area. 

“The new Film Center will be a cultural destination in New York City for every New Yorker and every person visiting New York City,” said Rose Kuo, Executive Director of the Film Society.  “It will offer the public a complete cultural experience, and so we hope our kickoff will offer a sampling of what we have in store for everyone in the years to come.”

Free tickets to events will be available starting one week prior. For information on these and additional events, as well as the schedule, please visit our website filmlinc.com. 

The launch events and their location are as follows:

FRANCESCA BEALE THEATER

ALEXANDER REVISITED screening with Oliver Stone Q&A

Featuring Oliver Stone’s dramatically revised final cut of ALEXANDER (2004), starring Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie.  Stone will attend and participate in a Q&A following the screening.

Paul Schrader’s Film Class Featuring: Bernardo Bertolucci’s THE CONFORMIST

Utilizing a newly restored print of Bertolucci’s classic THE CONFORMIST by Bologna Cineteca, Schrader will offer his own unique insights on filmmaking. 

Kevin Smith’s SMovieola presents VALLEY GIRL

Kevin Smith revisits Martha Coolidge’s 80s comedy classic, VALLEY GIRL, a film that among other things delivered Nicolas Cage to film fans forever after. Smith will moderate a Q&A including Coolidge and other special guests following the screening.

HOWARD GILMAN THEATER

Antonio Damasio on Cognitive Film Theory

ANTONIO DAMASIO will offer an insightful look at how we view films and what might explain our emotional responses and imaginative engagement to what we see on the big screen. Damasio, who is a Professor of Neuroscience, author, and director of the University of Southern California's Brain and Creativity Institute, has received numerous scientific prizes and is renowned worldwide for his work on mind and brain. His most recent book is Self Comes to Mind. 

Cinematheque de la Danse program

Courtesy of the Cinematheque de la Danse, a presentation of films from the distinctive collection of films celebrating and exploring the worlds of dance and jazz will be screened.

NYFF Opening Night Classics Movie Marathon

A twelve-hour marathon featuring past opening night films from the New York Film Festival’s 48-year history will screen for the film enthusiast whose endurance and fortitude can match their love of cinema. Films screened will include:     

DAY FOR NIGHT

DOWN BY LAW

MILLER’S CROSSING

PULP FICTION

RAN

WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN

FILM CENTER AMPHITHEATRE

Merv Bloch’s Trailer Show

MERV BLOCH'S TRAILER SHOW will provide an entertaining and comprehensive look at the work of one of the film Industry's legendary and most influential advertising minds. Bloch was the creative force behind the marketing and specifically the trailers for countless films iconic films through more than three decades. Trailers featured will include; THE TENANT, FLASHDANCE, GOLDFINGER, RAGTIME, CABARET, HANNAH AND HER SISTERS, THIEF, HEAVEN CAN WAIT, TERMS OF ENDEARMENT, CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS, FRIDAY THE 13TH, AN UNMARRIED WOMAN, SHADOWS AND FOG, HUD, THE WARRIORS, AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN, THE ELEPHANT MAN and MARATHON MAN.

Ghetto Film School Event: Screening THE STORY/LIVE, JOSEPH!

 

The award-winning South Bronx educational organization, Ghetto Film School will present a special screening of THE STORY, which follows twenty students from GFS as they prepare and shoot a narrative film in Uganda. The screening will be followed by a screening of the film they shot, LIVE, JOSEPH! and a conversation afterward with the GFS students and filmmaker Maurice Marable.

THE WALTER READE THEATER

Cinematheque Francaise Silents presents GRIBICHE with live musical accompaniment

Directed by Jacques Feyder, GRIBICHE (1926) is a silent film about a young boy who pines for his dead mother as he struggles to find happiness under the same roof with his stepmother and stepsister. The screening will be accompanied with a live piano performance by Donald Sosin.

Fredric Jameson on The Future of Film

One of only two Americans to have received the Holberg International Memorial Prize (in 2008), which is often called the Nobel Prize for the Humanities, Jameson is a noted literary critic and political Marxist theorist best known for his analysis of cultural trends. In this discussion, the man, whose most recent subjects have included postmodernism, as well as the study of utopia and science fiction, will turn his attention to the future of film as he sees it.

MY FAIR LADY screening

Families and classic movie musical fans alike will enjoy seeing the Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison starrer presented at the Walter Reade.

Jason Reitman presents CARNAL KNOWLEDGE (with Q&A featuring Mike Nichols)

Four-time Oscar-nominated writer-director Jason Reitman (JUNO, UP IN THE AIR) presents a screening of Oscar-winning director Mike Nichols’ landmark 1971 drama following 20 years in the lives and sexual escapades of college friends Jack Nicholson and Art Garfunkel. Q&A with Jason Reitman and Mike Nichols will follow the screening.

Hong Kong Film Archive presents CONFUCIUS

Written and directed by Fei Mui, a filmmaker admired by fans of classic Chinese cinema, CONFUCIUS was made in Shanghai and premiered with much fanfare towards the end of the ‘40s and was thought to be lost shortly after; a print was later found and restored which will be screened in the Walter Reade Theater.

TOAST screening

The first screening of the recently announced From Britain With Love film series co-presentation between FSLC, UK Film Council and Emerging Pictures, TOAST stars Academy Award-nominee Helena Bonham Carter and Freddie Highmore (CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY) in the drama of a young boy’s journey into adulthood based on the best-selling autobiography of food writer Nigel Slater.

The new Film Center will house 2 theaters, an amphitheater and a lounge cafĂ©. The 150-seat Francesca Beale Theater and the intimate 90-seat Howard Gilman Theater will show new specialized film releases. The Gilman will also offer special programs. The 90-seat amphitheater, with a 152” Panasonic Plasma screen (the largest of its kind on public display in the country) will house lectures, panels and educational programs. The Film Center's inaugural title will be Andrew Rossi’s PAGE ONE: INSIDE THE NEW YORK TIMES, an audience and critical favorite at the 2011 Sundance and SXSW Film Festivals, which will be released theatrically by Magnolia Pictures and play on both of the Film Center’s screens beginning June 17.  The Film Center’s official address is 144 W. 65th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam.

Film Society of Lincoln Center

Under the leadership of Rose Kuo, Executive Director, and Richard Peña, Program Director, the Film Society of Lincoln Center offers the best in international, classic and cutting-edge independent cinema. The Film Society presents two film festivals that attract global attention: the New York Film Festival, currently planning its 49th edition, and New Directors/New Films which, since its founding in 1972, has been produced in collaboration with MoMA. The Film Society also publishes the award-winning Film Comment Magazine, and for over three decades has given an annual award—now named “The Chaplin Award”—to a major figure in world cinema. Past recipients of this award include Charlie Chaplin, Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorsese, Meryl Streep, and Tom Hanks. The Film Society presents a year-round calendar of programming, panels, lectures, educational programs and specialty film releases at its Walter Reade Theater and the new state-of-the-art Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center, opening June 2011. The Film Society receives generous, year-round support from 42BELOW, American Airlines, The New York Times, Stella Artois, the National Endowment for the Arts, WNET New York Public Media, Royal Bank of Canada and the New York State Council on the Arts. For more information, visitwww.filmlinc.com