THE CONTENDERS, ISA GENZKEN: RETROSPECTIVE and More Set for MoMA's Nov 2013 Film Exhibitions

The Museum of Modern Art has announced its film exhibitions for the month of November 2013. Details below!

The Contenders 2013
November 4, 2013-January 2014
Every year there are films that resonate far beyond a theatrical release-if they manage to find their way to a commercial screen at all-or film festival appearance. Their significance can be attributed to a variety of factors, from structure to subject matter to language, but these films are united in their lasting impact on the cinematic art form. For this recurring series, the Department of Film combs through major studio releases and the top film festivals in the world, selecting influential, innovative films made in the past 12 months that we believe will stand the test of time. Whether bound for awards glory or destined to become a cult classic, each of these films is a contender for lasting historical significance, and any true cinephile will want to catch them on the big screen.

Click here for full description; screening schedule forthcoming.

Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You
November 15-November 18, 2013
For the eighth year running, MoMA's Department of Film, in association with IFP and its quarterly publication Filmmaker, brings you highlights from the festival circuit that have yet to be picked up for theatrical distribution, along with other discoveries, from visual artists working in the moving image to the latest indies not available in theaters. Past selections include Terence Nance's An Oversimplification of Her Beauty, Alex Karpovsky's Red Flag, Mark Jackson's Without, Laurel Nakadate's The Wolf Knife, Nina Paley's Sita Sings the Blues, So Yong Kim's In Between Days, and Ronald Bronstein's Frownland. Filmmakers take part in a Q&A following selected screenings.

Click here for full description; screening schedule forthcoming.

Isa Genzken: Retrospective
November 18-December 7, 2013
This screening series accompanies the Museum's presentation of Isa Genzken's (German, b. 1948) first comprehensive U.S. retrospective.Genzken's films, including a recent feature-length venture, offer a cinematic companion to the artist's diverse and experimental sculptural oeuvre. Like her sculptures, Genzken's films are, by turns, formally disciplined and comedic, providing a fractured but surprisingly personal perspective on her life as an artist.

Click here for full description and screening schedule.

The Berlin School: Films from the Berliner Schule
November 20-December 6, 2013
The fall of the Berlin Wall triggered a collapse not only of political institutions, but of many elements of German cultural identity as well, particularly in the former East. The three founding figures of what came to be known as the Berlin School-Thomas Arslan, Angela Schanelec, and Christian Petzold-all studied at the dffb (Deutsche Film-und Fernsehakademie Berlin), but their allegiance was to each other as filmmakers, not as members of a collective or organized movement. The Berlin School has always been a critical and aesthetic designation, not an artistic declaration; the "movement" is not aggressively political and the films are not thematically dogmatic. However, many of the filmmakers strive to provide a cinematic expression of the search for new identities in a reunited country. The films often focus on observant characters struggling to adapt in a time of societal change. All of the directors are from the former West, while many of the narratives focus on the Easterners who were more directly confronted by the collapse of their society. The films' portrayals of determined and desperate attempts to inhabit the present reject the notion that the most compelling German stories come from its totalitarian past. And while there are glimmers of optimism in an uncharted future, the films also expose a lingering reluctance to change. Filmmakers will be in attendance at select screenings.

Click here for full description and screening schedule.

Dante Ferretti: Designing for the Big Screen
Through February 9, 2014
Presented in conjunction with MoMA's Dante Ferretti gallery exhibition, this 22-film retrospective demonstrates how the designer's settings have served to guide directorial practice with signature distinction.Constructing "a working space for narrative" is how production designer Ferretti describes his role in the collaborative process of filmmaking and in his practice of conceiving, for each project, a single set piece intended to stimulate the director's imagination and crystallize the visual style and character of the film. Indulging his preference for both dreamlike and historical subjects, and drawing on his knowledge of painting, sculpture, and poetry, Ferretti categorizes his designs as "period" (Saló, or the 120 Days of Sodom), "fantasy" (The Adventures of Baron Munchausen), or "contemporary" (Todo Modo).

Click here for full description and screening schedule.

To Save and Project: The 11th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation
Through November 12, 2013
To Save and Project, MoMA's international festival of film preservation, celebrates its 11th year with gloriously preserved masterworks and rediscoveries of world cinema. Virtually all of the films in the festival are having their New York premieres, and some are shown in versions never before seen in the United States, including Michelangelo Antonioni's I Vinti (1953). This year's edition opens with a carte blanche weekend with Alexander Payne (Nebraska, The Descendants, Election, andSideways).

Click here for full description and screening schedule.

An Auteurist History of Film
Throughout November
Drawing on auteur theory-which contends that, despite the collaborative nature of the medium, the director is the primary force behind the creation of a film-this ongoing screening cycle is intended to serve as both an exploration of the richness of the Museum's film collection and a basic introduction to the emergence of cinema as the predominant art form of the 20th century.

Click here for full description and screening schedule.

Modern Mondays
An Evening with OpenEndedGroup: Marc Downie, Shelley Eshkar, and Paul Kaiser: Monday, November 11
An Evening with Christophe Hochhäusler and Benjamin Heisenberg:Monday, November 25

Click here for full description.

Pictured: The Little Bus Stop (Scaffolding, 2007-2009). 2012. Germany. Directed by Isa Genzken Distributing / Photofest.

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