For the 34th consecutive year, spring in New York will be ushered in by NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS, the acclaimed festival presented by The Department of Film and Media, The Museum of Modern Art, and The Film Society of Lincoln Center. The festival, which opens Wednesday, March 23, with Zeze Gamboa’s THE HERO, takes place at Alice Tully Hall and Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center and MoMA’s Titus 1 Theater at 11 West 53 Street. This popular and influential 12-day event, showcasing the finest in new filmmaking talent from around the world, runs through Sunday, April 3.
NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS 2005 includes 30 works from 22 countries, from Hungary to Haiti, China to Angola, Mexico to Morocco, Italy to Japan. There are 25 feature films and 8 short films in the festival, among them 4 American features and 2 American shorts. Nineteen of the twenty-five feature films are U.S. premieres; the other 6 are New York premieres. Thus far, 10 of the films have domestic distribution and are scheduled to open theatrically later this year.
NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS is one of the country’s premier showcases for the work of fresh and unsung international and American filmmakers. Over the course of more than three decades, the festival has introduced innovative works by talented directors from all over the world, many of whom have become major figures in world cinema, including Pedro Almodóvar, Héctor Babenco, Terence Davies, Atom Egoyan, Chen Kaige, Spike Lee, Richard Linklater, John Sayles, Steven Spielberg, and Wim Wenders, among many others.
During its 34-year history, NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS has premiered scores of films that have gone on to enjoy great critical and popular success, including, most recently, 2004’s Everyday People, The Story of the Weeping Camel, Dig!, Vodka Lemon, Control Room, and Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring; Raising Victor Vargas, Respiro, Camp, and the Academy Award-nominated My Architect (2003); Atanarjuat, The Fast Runner, Late Marriage, and Real Women Have Curves (2002); Lift, Nine Queens, L.I.E. (2001); and Jesus’ Son, Ratcatcher, and Human Resources (2000).
Films in the festival are selected by a six-person committee from the Department of Film and Media, The Museum of Modern Art (Mary Lea Bandy, Jytte Jensen, and Laurence Kardish) and The Film Society of Lincoln Center (Marian Masone, Joanna Ney, and Richard Peña).
NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS is sponsored by National Geographic Traveler Magazine and Audi. It is made possible through the generosity of The Julien J. Studley Foundation and The Irene Diamond Fund. Additional support from The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, The Junior Associates of The Museum of Modern Art, public funds from The New York State Council on the Arts, and South African Tourism. Special thanks to HBO Films for hosting the Directors Party.