Karen Cooper
Carte Blanche
David Corio, 1995
40 Years of
Documentary
P r e m i e r e s at
“If critics reviewed theaters as well
as performances, Film Forum would
be ablaze with countless stars. This
much-loved movie house is described
by film buffs as a city treasure,
a hipster’s paradise, a model for
cinemas worldwide... as sophisticated
and idiosyncratic as the films
shown within.” – New York’s Unique &
Unexpected Places (2009)
“Film Forum: Our
idea of heaven”
– “150 New York Essentials” issue,
Time Out NY (2008)
“Now ensconced in its new
triplex on West Houston Street,
the Film Forum is New York’s
most prestigious, active and
venturesome art-film theater.”
- John Rockwell,
The New York Times (1992)
“We may someday look back with gratitude at Film Forum’s
repertory operation as a golden age unto itself.” – Philip Lopate,
The New York Times (2000)
“The city’s top art-house theater”
– Rachel Wharton, Daily News (2008)
“Film Forum is a city treasure.
No other New York theater has
Film Forum’s range — a mix
of arcane and popular, avant– Andrew Sarris,
garde and retro. And no other
New York Observer (1989)
theater has the power of Film
Forum’s imprimatur. As a venue, Film Forum exerts an influence
far beyond Manhattan. Not only does a screening there ensure
national attention but the theater’s inventive programming has
been imitated by media centers across the nation. I’ve discovered
— or rediscovered — more great things at Film Forum than
I could ever possibly list.” – J. Hoberman, Departures Magazine (2008)
For Bruce Goldstein
My brilliant colleague for more than
two decades, who has established an
extraordinary, peerless repertory program.
Without Bruce’s superb taste, dedication,
passion and encyclopedic knowledge
of film — so much of what Film Forum
is today could never have been.
“New York’s
most
nourishing
cinema”
– Stephen Schiff,
Vanity Fair (1988)
“Film Forum
is an oasis.”
– David Denby, The New Yorker (1998)
“Film Forum, the town’s
invaluable rep house”
– Richard Corliss, Time Magazine (1999)
ROBIN HOLLAND
“A moviegoer’s
landmark”
A Walk Through
Film Forum
In the many years I have been taking a seat in its
theaters — and, for the last seven years, having
THE CITY OF NEW YORK
had one on its board of directors — this movie
OFFICE OF THE MAYOR
NEW YORK, NY 10007
house has branded my brain as the pre-eminent
American venue for independent film. Film Forum is
February 3, 2010
a national treasure not only because it celebrates the
importance of film in our culture but also because it
that shows movies, sells popcorn, and causes embarrassments of delight
th
It is a great pleasure to welcome all those celebrating the 40 anniversary of Film Forum.
Since the days of the Nickelodeon, New York City has been both a vital film production
center and a magnet for movie fans, boasting more specialized cinemas than any town in
America. Today, true to its rich cinematic tradition, New York remains a capital of cinematic
innovation. So I couldn’t imagine a better home for Film Forum. Since 1970, this organization
has provided a showcase for an array of films from around the world, from documentaries and
restorations to new, experimental works. And even as the cinema has expanded over the years,
its vital mission—to present a diverse range of movies regardless of their box-office potential—
has remained unchanged, and the organization continues to make invaluable contributions to our
City’s cultural life.
On behalf of movie-lovers from throughout the five boroughs, I am proud to applaud
everyone involved with Film Forum on their tremendous accomplishments over the past 40
years—and send my best wishes for even greater success on the horizon.
in the dark can also fulfill the charter of a non-profit arts organization.
Resolving the creative conundrum of balancing commerce and art has
been one of Film Forum’s biggest challenges and accomplishments.
For 40 years, Film Forum’s crack programmers have sought out the best
in cinematic art without bowing to the compromises of commerciality. Film
Forum is a leader for art house theaters around the country and provides
a key point of entry for independent distributors to connect audiences with
both the future of film and its past glories. One of Film Forum’s greatest
assets is its large, loyal audience base, built up and continuously fortified by
the distinguished programming selections of Karen Cooper, Bruce Goldstein
and Mike Maggiore. For a boutique distributor or an indie filmmaker with no
Sincerely,
distributor (yet), a slot on a screen on West Houston Street levels the playing
field against the juggernaut of the Hollywood-stuffed megaplex.
Michael R. Bloomberg
Mayor
Film Forum has democratized and energized the business of independent
film, making it healthier and more sustainable — and it boasts the best
popcorn in town. It’s no wonder that on the national landscape, Film Forum
projects itself much like its films, as an institution that’s larger than life. In the
history of cinema, this New York movie house will always have a footprint
much larger than its shoe size. May it march on…
– Richard Lorber
Chairman of the Board, Film Forum
2
3
ROBIN HOLLAND
creates a culture of film. Some wonder how any place
Dear Friends:
Karen Cooper
Interviewed
Then what?
I wanted to widen Film Forum’s scope. I went to
Cannes, to Oberhausen (a noted festival of short
films), and Berlin. I brought a more international
How did you come to run a movie theater? As a child were you
perspective to what we showed. And I worked
movie-crazy?
hard to market the films so there would be more
Not at all. I was drawn to dance, theater, literature, painting... all to a
than a half-dozen people sitting on those folding
much greater degree than to movies. Probably my most vivid childhood
chairs. The fact that the NY Times covered these
memory was as a teenager, in standing room, at the Metropolitan
shows was critical in attracting a larger audience.
Opera (the old one) seeing Nureyev and Fonteyn dance Romeo and
Ironically, in the early 1970s, no other publication
Juliet. That and attending the rehearsal of the Ed Sullivan show when
wrote about our movies.
the Beatles performed, seeing Ian Holm in Pinter’s The Homecoming,
I also brought a strong political commitment to
and experiencing the excitement of Jerome Robbins’s West Side Story.
the programming. The civil rights and the anti-
Growing up in NYC, I felt I had the opportunity to experience the best of
Fall 1972 calendar
everything. The Museum of Modern Art, before it underwent its several
Vietnam War movements played a critical part in
my growing up. Werner Herzog once said that he was concerned with
expansions, felt homey and safe.
beauty, but maybe justice was closer to what he was shooting for. This
notion of justice is key to a lot of my thinking.
Ok, so how did you end up as Director of Film Forum?
I was working for a now-defunct film magazine — the only job in “the
How did you learn to run a movie house?
arts” I could get in the recessionary early ’70s, when I met the young
Incrementally. It was a very small enterprise for many years: myself
man who was running a tiny 50-seat screening room, in a walk-up
and a projectionist. I sold the tickets and made the coffee. The budget
space on the Upper West Side. I liked the films he was showing.
was $19,000/year. Today it’s
I liked the feeling that one didn’t have to be among the cognoscenti
$4.4 million.
to attend. Peter Feinstein told me he planned to
done so). He offered me “the business” —
downtown
essentially a suitcase filled with carbon copies
Theater. SoHo was becoming a
of his letters to filmmakers — and a rubber
destination for artists. I still only
stamp (he didn’t have stationery). I knew I
ran movies on weekends. Then
could write equally cogent letters, and while
I had a very limited background in film, it
seemed to be a question of applying the same
critical point of view to movies as I had learned
to do with literature and so much else.
4
George griffin
In 1975 I moved Film Forum
Geraldine de Haugoubart
move on (co-founder, Sandy Miller had already
to
the
Vandam
in 1980, with a Ford Foundation
loan, I built a twin cinema on
Filmmaker Robert Breer’s jaunty multi-sided mural
enhanced our Watts Street cinema. Now demolished,
it can be glimpsed briefly in Jonathan Demme’s
SOMETHING WILD (1986).
Watts Street which remained
in operation through 1989. On
Watts Street I began to run
5
we’re seeking. Speaking for myself, I respond to films that do what all
good art does: it makes you feel and it makes you think. It’s made with
passion; it has a point of view, craftsmanship, and energy.
Years ago someone referred to me as a “generalist” and initially I was
offended. Then I realized that my diverse interests is one of the strengths
I bring to programming: American policy, the environment, theater, fashion,
psychology, women’s rights, painting and sculpture, history, architecture,
international affairs, human rights. I am as intrigued by REICHSAUTOBAHN,
a documentary on how the Nazis used something as mundane as the
construction of a superhighway to create incredibly effective fascistic
propaganda — as ASYLUM (actually the first movie I ever played, in the fall
of 1972), an inside look at R.D. Laing’s therapeutic community.
Why focus on documentaries for your 40th anniversary show at
NANCY CAMPBELL
MoMA?
When I was putting together a list of titles with which to approach the
museum’s curatorial staff, I couldn’t help but notice how many were
Robert Redford was our guest speaker at the Century Club in December 1980, at an
event designed to raise money to build the Watts Street cinema. Architect Stephen
Tilly is seen here as Redford and I check out his construction model.
documentaries. Clearly that’s where my heart is. I think real life is a lot
more complicated, nuanced and exciting than jewelry heists, prostitutesturned-society-ladies, drug deals gone wrong...
movies every day of the year. We finally had a marquee. Bruce Goldstein
Michael Moore has had a tremendous impact on the public’s notion of what a
joined me in late 1986 and developed an incredibly far-reaching repertory
documentary can be. But until the early 1990s, documentaries (“the d-word”)
program. But when the building was demolished, we had to rebuild. We
were considered box office poison. Audiences equated them with the most
opened exactly one year later in September 1990, on West Houston
didactic how-to movies (how to avoid venereal disease or car accidents) or
Street, now with three screens.
with celebrity-narrated social issue films. Documentaries that work theatrically
tell stories every bit as dramatic as fiction. It is so difficult to garner financial
Where do you find these movies? What do you look for in a film?
support to make an independent film that, inevitably, the documentary
Mike Maggiore and I co-program the premieres. We attend festivals
filmmaker is someone with a passion born of personal experience, political
throughout the year (Toronto, Cannes, Berlin, Amsterdam, Sundance,
zeal, and perhaps the sense that a tremendous amount is riding on revealing
among others) and we actively pursue work we read about in a spate
some aspect of human behavior or bringing public attention to a planetary
of publications. Filmmakers, distributors and sales agents who have
peril. A strong documentary engages the emotions as well as the intellect.
screened with us return with new movies. It is an ongoing treasure hunt,
It fashions characters and tells stories with the shape and pacing of great
the best part of the job. But we don’t have preconceived notions of what
fiction. Documentaries can make us laugh and cry and think.
6
7
What’s with all the Nazi movies?
that have minimal involvement with the efforts that go into promoting the
Our MoMA show includes a small sampling (REICHSAUTOBAHN,
films they play. There is a misconception that when a film premieres with
THE LIBERATION OF AUSCHWITZ, TERRORISTS IN RETIREMENT,
us and does particularly well, that we “lucked out.” Not so.
THE ARCHITECTURE OF DOOM) of the movies dealing with WWII
and the Holocaust that we’ve premiered [Note: Film Forum has also
premiered films on the Khmer Rouge, the gulags, Rwanda, the Rape of
Nanking, Katyn, the “disappeared” of Chile and Argentina, Hiroshima,
the Ukrainian famine, et alia.] The Nazis are a particularly compelling
phenomenon (see Susan Sontag’s “Fascinating Fascism”) because the
horrors they perpetrated were committed with elaborate calculation
Our nonprofit status allows us to raise money from public agencies
(the National Endowment for the Arts, the NYS Council on the Arts,
NYC’s Department of Cultural Affairs) and private sources (foundations,
corporations, individuals). Donations are tax-deductible. As a nonprofit
we have the luxury of being able to take risks, of showing films we believe
in, but for which we have little expectation of box office success.
by an educated, sophisticated people. These films plumb the depths
of evil — and in rare instances, the
What are the biggest changes you’ve seen in the movie business...
extraordinary courage and altruism of
other than people coming to documentaries?
those who resisted. Such extremes
The biggest changes are about technology: In 1986 VHS became
of behavior set parameters within
readily available. It had an immediate, negative effect on our bottom line
which each of us makes innumerable
because renting tapes was such a novelty. Our business took a big hit,
choices throughout our lives. The most
but then it came back. On the other hand, VHS made previewing work
significant documentaries on Nazis,
simple and cheap. Previously I looked at cumbersome 16mm prints, a
like those on any subject, resonate far
logistical nightmare. And DVDs are even more convenient. They make
beyond their ostensible subject. As
it possible to see films from around the world year-round, without ever
viewers it is for us to see past the trees,
leaving your monitor.
past the forest, to the horizon beyond.
REICHSAUTOBAHN
Film Forum is a nonprofit. How does it differ from commercial
movie houses, from other art houses?
Being nonprofit is a function of the way we were conceived: as a cultural
entity whose priority is the quality of the work we show, not the bottom
line. Film Forum staff does a lot more than just select movies that end
There is a notion that home viewing threatens the movie business —
perhaps in suburbia, but not in a city like New York. Eating at home is
more convenient and less expensive than going to a restaurant; that
hasn’t put restaurants out of business. Movies remain a social event.
The experience of a large screen and an excited audience will always be
different from sitting at home.
up on our screens. We’re involved in every aspect of the opening,
Like most smallish businesses, computers have had an enormous impact.
working with the distributor (and often directly with the filmmaker) to
They allow small businesses to accomplish things with a speed and
create marketing materials. We write press releases and organize press
sophistication that were once the exclusive province of big business. We
screenings, create ads and lobby displays; we produce detailed calendars
send an e-newsletter to nearly 48,000 people weekly. Fund-raising is a
and mail out tens of thousands of them. We use Facebook and Twitter
trickier issue. But, again, we are able to reach more people and ask even
to promote our movies. Commercial cinemas are essentially “venues”
those who cannot afford to be major donors for modest contributions.
8
9
Finally, digital projection has been
What do you do when you’re not working?
a huge boon. We show films in
I read and travel. Recently I finished Sonya Chung’s Long For This World.
35mm, digibeta and HDCAM.
It’s a first novel, to be published this spring: a subtle and nuanced story of
Filmmakers are working with
a Korean-American family. I love anything written by Doris Kearns Goodwin:
digital cameras that are cheaper
her book on the Roosevelts, No Ordinary Time, is brilliant. And I’m devoted
and lightweight (and thus have
to the DSM-IV (The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders),
greater
a 900-page guide to every dysfunctional personality imaginable.
particularly
ROBIN Holland
portability,
critical for documentaries).
In terms of the numbers of films
produced each year, there are easily
two or three times the amount of
Recently I went to Busan (Southern tip of Korea) for an international
film festival (well, I guess that qualifies as work) and I attend festivals in
Poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko was joined by Warren
Beatty when we premiered his semi-autobiographical
feature, THE KINDERGARTEN, in February 1986.
Amsterdam and Berlin annually (more work).
“product” from when I began in the early ’70s. Many mediocre films open
Any secret joys to running a cinema?
theatrically because their producers want some kind of visibility with which to
An endless supply of umbrellas.
sell the DVD. Much of this work does not deserve the attention of critics or the
public, and the tsunami of new films opening in NYC each week makes it that
much more difficult for the good ones to be heard above the fray.
What are some of your fondest memories?
There was the night Yevgeny Yevtushenko, the famed Russian poet, came
to the theater to introduce his movie, THE KINDERGARTEN. We invited
Warren Beatty to introduce him (they knew each other from Beatty’s
movie REDS). Together they were quite a juggernaut. There was the
cinema. I introduced him, but bungled his half-dozen titles. Plus the
accompanying Secret Service agents became nervous about our
strange-looking projectionist. My most satisfying recollection is the first
week of opening a full-time cinema on Watts Street in 1980. Here was a
street that no one could find, and yet we were able to sell tickets to a lot
of wonderful movies as esoteric as our location.
How about your worst memories?
Usually these relate to either equipment failures or celebrities who are
badly behaved: Liza Minnelli and Tony Curtis were bad news.
10
Geraldine de Haugoubart
night the King of Sweden introduced a program of new Scandinavian
Film Forum staff celebrate the opening of Frederick Wiseman’s LA DANSE: THE
PARIS OPERA BALLET at the home of board member Ted Rogers in November 2009.
(L-R) Keith Butler, Director of Development; Mike Maggiore, Programmer & Publicist;
Chad Bolton, General Manager; Brynn White, Repertory Programming Assistant;
Jenny Jediny, Repertory Publicist; Karen Cooper, Director; Elizabeth Barlow Rogers;
Frederick Wiseman; Ted Rogers; Adam Walker, Premieres Publicist.
11
Karen Cooper Carte Blanche:
40 Years of Documentary
Premieres at Film Forum
FEBRUARY 3–20, 2010
Karen Cooper became the director of Film Forum in 1972, two years after
its founding as an alternative space for independent cinema on Manhattan’s
Upper West Side. For the past twenty years, Film Forum has inhabited its
own three-screen movie house in the West Village, where it continues to
present an array of international films that confront diverse social, political,
historical, and cultural realities. To celebrate Film Forum’s fortieth anniversary
and the crucial role Cooper has played in keeping it a vital part of New
York’s film culture, the Department of Film invited her to select a number
of nonfiction films that premiered at Film Forum. While many of the films
are drawn from MoMA’s own collection, some are being loaned to us by
distributors and filmmakers, to whom we are grateful. Just a glance at the
titles she chose gives a sense of the diversity and richness of Film Forum’s
offerings through the years. Cooper supplements several of the screenings
with complementary short films, a staple of Film Forum’s cutting-edge
programming. The following film descriptions are excerpted from materials
written by Cooper for Film Forum’s original presentations.
– Laurence Kardish, Senior Curator,
Department of FIlm, The Museum of Modern Art, New york
Program organized by Laurence Kardish
My Architect. 2003. USA. Written and directed by Nathaniel Kahn. Louis Kahn, who in 1974 died
bankrupt and alone in New York City’s Pennsylvania Station, is considered by many architectural
historians to be the most important architect of the second half of the twentieth century. He left behind a
brilliant legacy of intensely powerful and spiritual buildings—geometric compositions of brick, concrete,
and light. Kahn’s death laid bare a complex personal life of secrets and broken promises; he led not
a double, but a triple life. In addition to his wife and daughter, there were two illegitimate children by
two women with whom he maintained long-term relationships. In My Architect, one of these children,
Kahn’s only son, Nathaniel, sets out on an epic journey to reconcile his father’s life and work. 116 min.
Wednesday, February 3, 4:00
12
John and Karen. 2007. Great Britain. Directed by Matthew Walker. 4 min.
Asylum. 1972. USA. Directed by Peter Robinson. R. D. Laing, British author and therapist, has shaken
the foundations of traditional psychiatric therapy by treating the schizophrenic experience as a sane
response to an insane environment. Robinson and his crew lived in Laing’s therapeutic community in
London for six weeks during the spring of 1971. Here is the first filmed record of Laing explaining his
theories and the institution which was born of them. There were between fifteen and eighteen people in
the community during filming, and it is a tribute to Mr. Robinson’s sensitivity and discretion that he was
able to capture their lives with a minimum of interference. 95 min. Wednesday, February 3, 7:30
(introduced by Karen Cooper); Friday, February 5, 4:00
Let’s Get Lost. 1988. USA. Directed by Bruce Weber. Let’s Get Lost, also the name of a long outof-print Chet Baker tune, aptly describes the driving force of this man and his music. His James Dean
looks and cool sound set Baker apart from the other musicians of his time and gave a generation of
jazz fans a Doomed Youth of their very own. Baker’s life plays out like a Kerouac creation, as did his
death (he fell out of an Amsterdam hotel window one Friday the thirteenth). Following the elusive and
digressive nature of their star, Weber, cinematographer Jeff Preiss, and the rest of the crew went on the
road from the West Coast to the East, to continental Europe, during what turned out to be the last year
of the musician’s life. 120 min. Thursday, February 4, 4:00
Under the Brooklyn Bridge. 1955. USA. Directed by
Rudy Burckhardt. 15 min.
Arguing the World. 1997. USA. Produced, written,
and directed by Joseph Dorman. With Daniel Bell, Irving
Howe, Nathan Glazer, Irving Kristol. Four of the twentieth
century’s leading thinkers believe passionately that
ideas can change the world…especially their ideas. And
they have been disagreeing with a vengeance since the
1930s, when they sat together as young radicals in the
City College cafeteria hashing out the future of Marxism.
ARGUING THE WORLD
Arguing the World explores the passions, the issues, and
the eras that shaped their lives. According to Alfred Kazin, “They were all critics with a capital ‘C’
and they were critics, first and foremost, of each other.” Courtesy First Run Features. 107 min.
Thursday, February 4, 7:00; Saturday, February 6, 1:00
Serious Business Company
Freude Bartlett founded Serious Business Company in 1972 to distribute a vibrant range of independent
experimental, animated, and documentary films. With tremendous panache, she championed the work
of more than 60 artists, representing more than 250 titles. This is a sampling of some of the works
she helped launch, all of which premiered at Film Forum. Additional details on Freude Bartlett/Serious
Business Company and these films appears on pages 20-21.
Viewmaster. 1976. USA. Directed by George Griffin. 3 min.
Take the 5:10 to Dreamland. 1976. USA. Directed by Bruce Conner. 6 min.
13
The Battle of Chile, Part 2: The Coup d’État. 1976. Chile/Cuba. Directed by Patricio
Guzmán. Guzmán recorded the events leading up to the coup (the overthrow of Salvador Allende)
and the coup itself in his epic, three-part The Battle of Chile. Part 2: The Coup d’État opens with a
botched attempted coup thwarted by troops loyal to the government. The film shows a Left divided
over strategy, while the Right methodically lays the groundwork for a military seizure of power.
Dramatic concluding sequences document the actual revolution, including Allende’s last radio
messages and footage of the aerial bombing of the presidential palace. In English, Spanish; English
subtitles. 91 min. Sunday, February 7, 1:30
L’opéra-mouffe. 1958. France. Directed by Agnès
Varda. 17 min.
The Gleaners and I. 2000. France. Directed and
narrated by Agnès Varda. Varda is considered the
“grandmother of the New Wave,” a filmmaker who got
Karen Cooper and Agnès Varda in October
her start in 1954 with La Pointe Courte, edited by Alain
2000 at a party for THE GLEANERS AND I
Resnais. Best known in the U.S. for her features Vagabond
(1985), One Sings, the Other Doesn’t (1976), and Jacquot (1991), Varda’s work melds literary
documentary conventions, the politics of feminism and compassion, and a special whimsy that is all
her own. The Gleaners and I continues in the essayist tradition of her earlier films—a warm and witty
discourse on, among other things, the nature of our consumerist society and the role of creativity in
survival. In French; English subtitles. 82 min. Saturday, February 6, 3:15
Abductees. 1995. Great Britain. Directed by Paul Vester. 11min.
Crumb. 1994. USA. Directed by Terry Zwigoff. A riveting picture of the
artist whom critic Robert Hughes has called “the Breughel of the twentieth
century,” the film explores Crumb’s iconoclastic vision, his sexual obsessions,
and his use of taboo images as a response to the “family values” learned
at the hands of a brutal father and amphetamine-addicted mother. Interviews
with Robert’s brothers Charles and Max, who as children also took refuge
in art, complete this darkly funny, haunting look at our culture—at the
nuclear family, the artist as sexual outlaw, and the capriciousness of fate
as played out in a single family. Courtesy Sony Pictures Classics. 119 min.
Saturday, February 6, 8:15
14
© Robert Crumb
The Architecture of Doom. 1989. Sweden. Produced, written, edited, and directed by
Peter Cohen. Narrated by Bruno Ganz. Using Nazi archival materials (much of which, we believe, is
presented [in this work] for the first time), the Swedish filmmaker makes an intellectually provocative
case for his thesis that National Socialism was an aesthetic movement—that WWII and the genocide
of the Jews and others directly resulted from the Nazis’ perverse notion of “beauty through violence.”
Courtesy First Run Features. In German; English subtitles. 119 min. Saturday, February 6, 5:30;
Monday, February 8, 8:00
Geraldine de Haugoubart
Homage to Magritte. 1975. USA.
Directed by Anita Thacher. 10 min.
1970. 1972. USA. Directed by Scott Bartlett.
30 min.
The Life and Death of Frida Kahlo. 1976.
USA. Directed by Karen and
David Crommie. 40 min.
Program 89 min. Introduced by Karen Cooper,
George Griffin. Friday, February 5, 7:00
The Underground Orchestra. 1998. The Netherlands. Directed by Heddy Honigmann. A
glorious documentary profiling musicians who play on the sidewalks of Paris and in the Metro.
Honigmann illuminates the lives and music of a ragtag group of international bohemians: an
Argentine pianist, Romanian father-and-son violinists, a Venezuelan harpist, and singers from Mali
and Vietnam. All are united by their experiences with political repression, and by a luminous spirit and
boundless courage that led them to flee any number of horrendous situations throughout the world.
Finding refuge in Paris, music becomes their economic lifeline, but as this film makes movingly
clear, it is also a shining metaphor for their will to survive. Courtesy Icarus Films. In French, Spanish;
English subtitles. 108 min. Sunday, February 7, 3:30; Monday, February 8, 4:30
Reichsautobahn. 1985. West Germany. Produced, written, and directed by Hartmut Bitomsky. In
the words of Adolf Hitler, “Where Germany ends, the pot-holes can begin.” Hitler’s Third Reich brought
to fruition “the biggest German edifice of all time,” a vast, streamlined highway that crisscrossed
Germany and that even today remains a model of modern engineering. Reichsautobahn is composed
largely of original, Nazi-produced films and artifacts: newsreels and industrials, how-to movies and
The premiere of Patricio Guzman’s THE BATTLE OF CHILE attracted long lines even in
the middle of a snowstorm in January 1978 at our Vandam Street cinema.
15
photographic studies, paintings, coffee table books, and souvenirs of every type. Bitomsky uses
the autobahn to construct a fascinating case history for his larger, more significant concern, the
nature of fascist propaganda. In German; English subtitles. 90 min. Sunday, February 7, 6:00;
Wednesday, February 10, 4:00
Vincent: The Life and Death of Vincent Van Gogh. 1987. Australia. Written and directed
by Paul Cox. Based on the letters of Vincent van Gogh. Read by John Hurt. Music by Antonio Vivaldi,
Gioacchino Rossini, Norman Kaye. Vincent explores the artist’s final ten years through the eloquent
letters he wrote his brother Theo. Read by John Hurt, van Gogh’s words vividly describe his early
religious impulses, his longing to paint, his relentless poverty, and personal anguish. Cox’s images
record the landscapes of Holland and France as the artist might have experienced them and, of course,
the glorious paintings themselves. Paul Cox is known for his critically acclaimed features Lonely Hearts,
Man of Flowers, My First Wife, and Cactus. (print courtesy Roxie Releasing, San Francisco). 105 min.
Wednesday, February 10, 7:00; Thursday, February 11, 4:00
Terrorists in Retirement. 1984. France. Directed by Mosco Boucault. Narrated by Simone
Signoret, Gérard Desarthe. The “terrorists” are a handful of now-elderly men who recount their
experiences as illegal Jewish refugees who fled Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe for the relative safety
of Paris in the early 1940s. As “French” Resistance fighters they carried out the most dangerous
assignments, assassinating Nazis on the metro or in the streets. Boucault uncovers considerable
evidence that local Communist Party members betrayed them—allowing many to be arrested by the
French police and turned over to the Nazis in late 1943. Courtesy the Cultural Services of the French
Embassy, New York. In French; English subtitles. 84 min.
The Liberation of Auschwitz. 1986. West
Germany. Directed and produced by Irmgard von
zur Mühlen, Begt von zur Mühlen. A film composed
principally of Soviet film footage, shot between
January 27 and February 28, 1945, when the
Russian troops entered the Auschwitz concentration
camp. The footage found its way onto the shelves
of Soviet archives, where it remained for some forty
years, until the resourceful Von zur Mühlens tracked
it down through Alexander Voronstov, the only
surviving cameraman from the wartime team.
Courtesy Goethe-Institut, New York. English-language
version. 60 min. Thursday, February 11, 7:00;
Friday, February 12, 4:00
The Smell of Burning Ants. 1994. USA. Directed
by Jay Rosenblatt. 21 min.
The Atomic Café. 1982. USA. Directed by Kevin
Rafferty, Jayne Loader, Pierce Rafferty. The Atomic
The Atomic Café
Café is a compilation film of government, military,
and educational materials produced during the late 1940s and 1950s to sell the atomic bomb
to the American public. It is an often funny, often absurd, ultimately chilling film that tells us
something about the vulnerability, innocence, ignorance, and arrogance of the post-WWII era. 88
min. Friday, February 12, 7:00; Saturday, February 13, 1:00
Concert of Wills: Making the Getty Center. 1997. USA. Directed by Susan Froemke,
Bob Eisenhardt, Albert Maysles. With Richard Meier, John Walsh, Harold M. Williams, Stephen
Rountree. Los Angeles’s Getty Center, a sprawling, six-building hillside complex fourteen years in
the making, was to be the architectural vision of renowned architect Richard Meier. Meier’s runins with San Diego artist Robert Irwin, commissioned to design the central garden (and to “shake
things up a bit,” in the words of one Getty VP); with French architect Thierry Despont, brought in
to add color and warmth to the building’s interior; and with Getty executives themselves, who fear
that “Richard seems almost to have a hostility toward comfort,” make for wonderful, mesmerizing
high drama. 100 min. Saturday, February 13, 3:15
THE WAR ROOM
16
The War Room. 1993. USA. Directed by D. A. Pennebaker, Chris Hegedus. The film is an
endlessly fascinating look inside the shrewdest, funniest, most sophisticated political machine
ever. It was made possible by the filmmakers’ unique degree of access to James Carville and
George Stephanopoulos—Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign’s master strategists—and their
inner sanctum, “the war room.” The two prove wonderfully dramatic complementary forces:
George, a darkly handsome, winsome, and serious thirty-one-year-old former Rhodes Scholar;
James, a sly, passionate, expletive-spewing Cajun. 96 min. Saturday, February 13, 5:30
17
La Soufrière. 1977. Germany. Directed by Werner Herzog. The filmmaker visits Guadeloupe on
the eve of the threatened eruption of the island’s volcano, La Soufrière. 30 min.
Lessons of Darkness. 1992. Germany/France/Spain. Written, directed, and narrated by
Werner Herzog. A lyrical meditation on the ecological and human destruction begat by the Gulf
War. Herzog brings an artist’s eye and a philosopher’s sensibility to this previously untold tale of
modern horror. Extraordinary helicopter cinematography records a science fiction-like scenario as
countless Kuwaiti oil fields blaze out of control and millions of tons of oil pour into the sea. 50 min.
Saturday, February 13, 7:45; Monday, February 15, 4:00
foreign correspondent based in Paris,
Rubbo visits with a host of French opinionmakers—journalists, writers, politicians. and
philosophers who represent the vociferous,
fragmented voices of the French Left,
including the dazzling Bernard-Henri Levy.
Courtesy the National Film Board of Canada.
In French; English subtitles. 87 min. Sunday,
February 14, 3:30
ROBIN HOLLAND
Frank Film. 1973. Directed by Frank Mouris, Caroline Mouris. 9 min.
Paris Is Burning. 1990. USA. Directed by Jennie Livingston. With Pepper Lebeija, Willi Ninja,
Octavia Saint Laurent, Venus Xtravaganza. An intimate exploration of the fiercely competitive, wildly
creative, and outlandishly extravagant world of Harlem drag balls. Outweek writes, “Paris Is Burning
is that rare find: a documentary that combines drama, sociology, culture, and history into a powerful,
passionate, and entertaining package.... A younger generation of gay black men have transformed
their oppressive reality into an intricate world of glamour and fantasy.” Winner of the 1990 L.A. Film
Critics’ Award for the Best Documentary and co-winner for Best Documentary at the 1991 Sundance
Film Festival. 78 min. Sunday, February 14, 1:30
Colette. 1951. France. Directed by Yannick Bellon. 30 min.
Solzhenitsyn’s Children Are Making a Lot of Noise in Paris. 1979. Canada. Written
and directed by Michael Rubbo. With Louis-Bernard Robitaille. Solzhenitsyn’s Children was filmed
almost ten years after the events of May 1968—the largest general strike in French history and
the Soviet invasion of Prague. The structure is simple: with the aid of Robitaille, a French-Canadian
Karl May. 1974. West Germany. Written
and directed by Hans-Jürgen Syberberg.
With Helmut Käutner, Käthe Gold, Kristina
Söderbaum, Mady Rahl. The film reflects its
director’s now-famous obsession with the
major figures who have shaped twentiethHans-Jürgen Syberberg
century German history and consciousness.
Karl May (1842–1912), a one-time convict, was the author of an enormously successful series
of adventure stories of American Indians, but never visited any of the places he describes in
meticulously accurate detail; he further blurred issues of fact and fiction, believing himself to be
“Old Shutterhand,” the hero of his imagined tales. 187 min. Sunday, February 14, 5:30;
Monday, February 15, 7:00
MICHEL COMTE
Domestic Violence. 2001. USA. Directed by Frederick Wiseman. One of Wiseman’s most
devastating and compassionate films, Domestic Violence centers on a Tampa, Florida shelter for
battered women and their children, and follows the police as they intervene—or find themselves
powerless to intervene—in harrowing family disputes. “Some of the women are sullen and abashed
and so quiet that they seem to have relinquished the right to be indignant over what has happened
to them,” New Yorker critic David Denby observes. “But others are blazingly articulate, their stories
leaping from them in magnificent tirades...Domestic Violence is a chronicle of victimization in which
the women’s suffering is increased by their knowledge that they have been partly complicit in it...
But a termination point has been reached: the women in the shelter have left. The film is fervently
devoted to the near-impossible act of walking out.” 196 min. Wednesday, February 17, 6:45;
Saturday, February 20, 7:00
Special thanks to Rajendra Roy, the Celeste Bartos Chief Curator of Film, and
Laurence Kardish, Senior Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern
Art, New York, for their kind help in making this program possible.
Paris is Burning
18
19
Freude Bartlett
being young and in love in the Bay Area (including the birth of their son
The Serious Business Years
Elon); VIEWMASTER by George Griffin, at once a paean to the Animal
Freude Bartlett’s Serious Business Company’s catalogue, featuring more
an elegant, reinterpretation of that artist’s sensibility by a woman who
than 250 independently made documentary, animated, and experimental
has no problem relating the sensuality of an egg yolk to the beauty of
films, had a full page description of THE LIFE AND DEATH OF FRIDA
crashing ocean waves; Bruce Conner’s 5:10 TO DREAMLAND, a surreal
KAHLO by David and Karen Crommie whose headline read: Do you know
compilation of found footage (by the master of this genre) that features
this woman? Within a few years, the rest of the world had caught up with
among several unforgettable moments: a waking rabbit, set to the haunting
Freude’s appreciation of Kahlo’s art and fascination with her stormy life
music of Patrick Gleeson; the Crommies’ THE LIFE AND DEATH OF
and marriage to Diego Rivera. (Paul Leduc’s FRIDA and Julie Taymor’s
FRIDA KAHLO, a film that had particular resonance for Freude because
FRIDA were both feature-length dramatizations of her life.)
its subject, like herself, overcame a serious physical disability (for Freude,
But do you know Freude Bartlett? She was a pioneer distributor of
Locomotion series by Eadweard Muybridge and a humorous tribute to
the notion of life on the run; Anita Thacher’s HOMAGE TO MAGRITTE,
childhood polio) through her prodigious creative gifts.
– Karen Cooper
cutting-edge films, especially those made by women and from a feminist
perspective. Freude loved movies. She made movies of her own and
became a distributor, initially to help market the experimental films of Scott
Bartlett, her husband. For more than a dozen years, Serious Business
Company championed some of the West Coast greats: James Broughton,
Jordan Belson, Gunvor Nelson, Pat O’Neill, Robert Nelson, Bruce Conner,
Tom DeWitt, Chick Strand, John Knoop, Kathleen Laughlin, Bruce Baillie,
Scott Bartlett, James Whitney, Suzan Pitt, Sally Cruikshank, et alia.
Freude had a fiercely inquisitive mind and a far-ranging intellect. Her impulse
was always to speak truth to power, and the films she felt most strongly
about did just that. She had a deep appreciation for life’s absurdities,
joys and disappointments and an uncommon degree of courage and
fortitude to build a business from movies that had previously been on no
one’s radar. She combined wildly impractical, uncompromising idealism
with a shrewd sense of marketing and a work ethic and energy level of
TERRI P. TEPPER
astounding strength. Plus there was an endless supply of charm and a
smoker’s deep, throaty laugh.
Our program is a tribute to her person and to her accomplishments. It
features 1970 by Scott Bartlett, a poetic evocation of the heady joys of
20
Freude Bartlett, 1942 – 2008
21
Acknowledgements
and Thanks
To my esteemed mentors and predecessors:
Amos and Marcia Vogel, founders of Cinema
16, the influential film society that pioneered
independent film exhibition from 19471963... To Dan and Toby Talbot, founders of
Goldstein, who in 1987 created Film Forum’s repertory program and
whose imaginative, tireless, and endlessly creative gifts have informed so
much of what we do. To Mike Maggiore, my co-programmer and the head
publicist for all of our premieres, since 1994. He has introduced me to
aspects of world cinema previously unknown to me and has brought his
the legendary New Yorker Theater, and its
Geraldine de Haugoubart
Thank you to all my colleagues, past and present, especially Bruce
successors — Cinema Studio, the Metro,
Lincoln Plaza — and the distribution company,
New Yorker Films — and their indefatigable
right-hand man, Jose Lopez, who could and
Marcia and Amos Vogel with Werner
Herzog at a party for the premiere of his
film, MY BEST FIEND, in November 1999.
smart, kind persona to all decisions great and small.
did answer any question having to do with
film exhibition in the blink of an eye.
To our earliest supporters in the press: Roger Greenspun, the New York
To the architect who designed and oversaw construction of two Film
Times film critic who, with Vincent Canby, established that newspaper’s
Forum theaters, on Watts Street in 1980 (with architectural partner Alan
commitment to covering our openings.
Buchsbaum) and on West Houston Street 10 years later: Stephen Tilly.
His thoughtful, playful, graceful designs have made the theater a pleasure
To our first financial supporters: Ford Foundation officers Richard Knapp,
in which to work.
Nancy Boggs and Richard Sheldon who gave Film Forum its major
grants in the early 1970s... and to the Ford Foundation for its 2000 grant,
To Roger Getzoff and his son, Steve Getzoff, our technical wizards for
establishing an endowment fund to help stabilize our financial outlook for
the past 30 years, on hand day and night, to deal with any and all issues
the years to come ... Barbara Haspiel, from the NYS Council on the Arts,
regarding the projection booth. Their ability to keep equipment working
who oversaw our earliest public funding and taught me the finer points
seven days a week, 365 days of the year, is just this side of magical.
of writing a budget... Clara Miller, Executive Director of the Nonprofit
Facilities Fund, who provided significant loans toward the construction
To our not-quite in-house photographer, Robin Holland, who has so elegantly
of our current cinema... The Ostrovsky Family Fund and the Cordelia
photographed so many of the filmmakers whose work we’ve played. We
Corporation, both of which have provided generous support for our
have been fortunate to have her images grace our walls.
operations over many years and, most recently, for the purchase and
construction of new administrative offices. A complete list of current
To our designers: Linda and Kathleen Gates of the Gates Sisters Studio,
who have designed all of our advertising, calendars, and graphics since
1990 with skill, smarts, good humor and great speed!
22
GEORGE GRIFFIN
funders begins on page 26.
To my recently deceased friend Freude Bartlett, who, through
her pioneering distribution company, Serious Business,
championed experimental, animated and documentary films
in the 1970s and ’80. Freude was a brilliant businesswoman
Roger Getzoff installs
our first 35mm
projectors in 1980.
whose talent extended to writing, editing, marketing and
strategizing all aspects of her business and mine. Her advice
23
and love were invaluable to me and to Film Forum for nearly four decades. A
1
longer appreciation of Freude Bartlett begins on page 20.
2
3
To my family: husband/lover/friend/animator/fixer-of-projectors-in-a-crunch
George Griffin. No one else has shared so many mornings of either joyous
or disgruntled readings of New York Times movie reviews. Our lives have
been filled with walks, talks, travels and much else that would never
4
have been conceivable without him... My daughter, artist Nora Griffin,
who was forced to sit through Emile de Antonio’s POINT OF ORDER
5
before I’d let anyone partake in Thanksgiving dinner one year, and who
keeps me on my toes by bringing a fresh and lively critical intelligence to
everything in her purview.
– Karen Cooper
6
New York City, January 2010
7 Mike Maggiore and John Turturro in November 2005, at a party celebrating Turturro’s
ROMANCE & CIGARETTES
8 Daniel and Patricia Ellsberg, subjects of THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN AMERICA:
DANIEL ELLSBERG AND THE PENTAGON PAPERS, at a party for the film’s opening in
September 2009
9 Carter Burwell (composer of the music for our trailer) and Steven Shainberg,
at a November 2006 party for Shainberg’s feature, FUR.
10 Documentary legend D.A. Pennebaker in October 2000
11 Kelly Reichardt at a party for her film WENDY AND LUCY in November 2008
Geraldine de Haugoubart
12 André Leon Talley (left), Vogue Editor-at-Large, joins Matt Tyrnauer for a Q&A
at the premiere of Tyrnauer’s documentary hit, VALENTINO: THE LAST EMPEROR,
in March 2009.
24
8
PHOTOS: CHERYL GOTTSCHALL (1-6); , Geraldine de Haugoubart (7-11); Theodore Alexandre (12)
opposite page:
Images 1-6 are from a benefit gala held at the Puck Building, April 19, 1990,
to raise money to build our Houston Street cinema.
1 Garson Kanin and Marian Seldes 2 Christopher Walken
3 George Griffin (left), Karen Cooper, Warrington Hudlin 4 Dana and Christopher Reeve
5 David Johansen leads a conga line. 6 Susan and Howard Kaminsky
7
9
12
10
11
25
Many Thanks to
Our 2009 Donors
$2,500 - $9,999
Richard & Ronay Menschel
Ad Hoc Foundation, Inc.
Mertz Gilmore Foundation
Yvette J. Alberdingk-Thijm
Patrick & Jerilyn Montgomery/
Montgomery-Taber Family Fund
Stuart S. Applebaum
Michael Barker
Hugo Barreca/The Double R Foundation
$100,000 & above
Donald S. & Jo Ellen Finkel Bernstein
Charina Endowment Fund
Susan V. Berresford
J. Kerry Clayton & Paige Royer
Virginia Brody
Cinetic Media
The Kaplen Foundation
M. Graham Coleman
Consolidated Edison Company of NY, Inc.
National Endowment for the Arts
David Corkery
Davis Wright Tremaine LLP
$50,000 - $99,999
Jeanne Donovan Fisher
Mary K. Doris
The Carnegie Corporation of NY
John Dutton
New York State Council on the Arts
Richard W. & Carolene S. Eaddy
Bruce L. Eder
Paul A. Ferrara
$15,000 - $49,999
Andrew Fierberg & Guiliana Bruno
Kimberley F. & Brian Carlson,
In Memory of George Fasel
Pannonia Foundation
Rohauer Collection Foundation
Howard Gilman Foundation
Nancy Dine
John G. Roche
Edward & Marjorie Goldberger Foundation
Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation
Theodore C. Rogers
New York City Department
of Cultural Affairs
Harry S. Thomson Foundation
Ostrovsky Family Fund
Norman & Rosita Winston
Foundation
Adaline Frelinghuysen
David Grubin Productions
The Robert Halper Foundation
Russel Hamilton
Norman Hanson & Guy Dauerty
Hayes Family Fund
Susan G. Jacoby/The Gottesman Fund
Elizabeth Kahler
David Koepp
$10,000 - $14,999
Susan W. Lacy
Nancy Chang & Daniel Rossner
Alan & Lauren Klein
Frances Lear Foundation
The Chervenak-Nunnallé Foundation
Ellen Levy Foundation
Lemberg Foundation
Lavinia M. Currier & Joel McCleary
The Leyli Foundation
Grand Marnier Foundation
Mary W. Harriman Foundation
New York Times Company
Foundation
HBO
Michael & Donna Sternberg
Wayne S. Kabak & Marsha Berkowitz
Susan Talbot
The J.M. Kaplan Fund
Shelly Wanger
The Charles & Lucille King Family
Foundation
Anonymous (1)
26
Francis Levy & Hallie Cohen
New York City Department for the Aging
New York State Office of Parks and Recreation
Caryl B. Ratner
Ira M. Resnick Foundation
Frank H. Rich & Alex Witchel
Max Rifkind-Barron/
The Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation
Jane Scovell/Rhoda & Louis Scovell
Charitable Foundation Fund
Susan Stein Shiva Foundation
Daniel & Toby Talbot
Jonathan M. Tisch
John & Katherine Turturro
Gus Van Sant/The Wendy Foundation
Sudhir Venkatesh
Village Voice
Vox3 Films
Marissa C. Wesely & Fred Hamerman
William Morris Agency
Michelle Williams
Margo S. Wintersteen/Sand Dollar Foundation
Fred Wistow
WSK Management, LLC
$1,000 - $2,499
Frank J. Anelante
Michael Badalucco & Brenda Heyob
Donald & Marlena Baraf
Eric Bogosian & Jo Bonney
Leslie S. Bornstein
Paula Botstein & Robert Usadi
Mark J. Catalano
Mitchell W. Lichtenstein
Andrew H. Chapman
Liman Foundation
Alyce F. Cleese
Little Bear, Inc.
Eric & Stacy Cochran
Richard Lorber & Dovie F. Wingard
Joel Coen & Frances McDormand
Lorber Media
Janet L. Cohen
Manhattan Borough President’s Office,
Scott M. Stringer
León & Michaela Constantiner
Nisha Gupta McGreevy
Allen Coulter & Kim Knowlton
Sandy McLeod & Sam Dryden
Cowles Charitable Trust
Abhishek Mehta
Joseph E. Cosgriff
continued on next page
27
Many Thanks to
Our 2009 Donors
continued from previous page
Building Our Cinema
Edward & Elena C. Lord Charitable Gift Fund
Lutz & Carr
Julianne Moore
Brooke Devine
Beth Rudin DeWoody
Lynn H. Ratner
Lisabeth During
Barbara Rick
Isabelle Dushesne
David Rivel
Susan Farkas
Rosemary A. Rotondi
Gary J. Firuta
Alan & Eileen Sarroff
Ella Foshay
Arnie Sawyer
Steve Friedman & Maggie Buehler
Steve Schrader & Lucy Kostelanetz
David & Gisela Gamper
David Schwartz Foundation
Deborah Koons Garcia
Neal Shapiro & Juju Chang
Richard A. Garvey
Leonora M. Shelsey
Peter Gethers
Cindy Sherman
Laurel Gonsalves
Kristen C. Siebecker
Pamela Grace
Paul Singer
Alba Greco
Jonathan J. Sirota
Warren & Andrea Grover
John Sloss
Jake Gyllenhaal
Stephen Soba & Jonathan Arnold/
Grace R. & Alan D. Marcus Foundation
Hal Hartley
Wendy Keys & Donald A. Pels
Jeffrey Levy-Hinte/
Antidote International Films, Inc.
Stephen L. Spiegel
Peter Straub
Sundance Channel
Helene Howard
P. R. Sundaresan
Scott Isler & Laura Piccone
Sukey Tamarkin
The JKW Foundation
Adam Tedman
Jocelyn Joson & Steve Hamilton
Joel S. Truman
Maira Kalman
Margo & Anthony Viscusi
Howard Kaminsky
Ronald & Diane Weinfeld
Vincent I. Katz & Vivien Bittencourt Katz
Gary Winnick
Jonathan S. Lee
Nina Winthrop/Lion and Hare Fund
John Leff
Nancy Workman
David O. Leiwant
J. Anthony Wright
Allan J. Lenzner
Judith Wu
Stuart E. Leyton
Anonymous (10)
The Herman Liebmann Foundation
Hely Lima & Herbert Zohn
Gifts received through
Leo Model Foundation
December 31, 2009
28
Stephen Tilly Architects
Sheila Nevins
Liz. & Gus Oliver
Charles waller
The Dorothy and Mark Nelkin Charitable Fund
Jean de Segonzac
Robin Holland
Yves & Constance de Balmann
PETER AARon/ESTO Photographics
Daniel M. Neidich and Brooke Garber
Foundation
PETER AARon/ESTO Photographics
Charles E. Culpeper Fund
George Griffin
John Morning
Karen Crennan
Drawing by Charles
Waller was commissioned
by us to illustrate the
destruction of our
Watts Street cinema for
real estate development.
29
Film Forum
Board of Directors
1970 – 2010
Jane Alexander
Andrew Fierberg
Ned Lord
David Salle
Alice Arlen
Adaline Frelinghuysen
Jim Mann
Peter Saraf
Jacqueline L. Bazan
Richard Garvey
Joy Marcus
Marian Schwindeman
Liz Berger
Seth Gelblum
Marian McEvoy
Jane Scovell
Kathryn McGraw Berry
Clark Gesner
Nisha Gupta McGreevy
Frank Shepard
Nancy Boggs
Donna Gigliotti
Abhishek Mehta
Alexandra Shiva
Donald Bogle
Peter Greer
Peter Minichiello
Robert Sargent Shriver
Vivian Bower
David Grubin
Patrick Montgomery
Raphael D. Silver
Belinda Breese
Michael Hausman
Brenda Moore
John Sloss
Stanley Buchthal
Maureen A. Hayes
John Morning
Wendy Stein
Nan Bush
Solange Herter
Mira Nair
Michael Sternberg
David Byrne
Henry Hocherman
Sheila Nevins
Susan Talbot
Mary Schmidt Campbell
Celeste Holm
Susan Newhouse
Andrea Taylor
John Carlin
John M. Irwin
Liz Oliver
Juliet Taylor
Debra Chase
Eugene Jarecki
Vivian Ostrovsky
Kendall Thomas
Gray Coleman
Wayne Kabak
Jeanne Erwin Parks
Stephen Tilly
Karen Cooper
Lawrence Kamerman
Robert Parrish
John Turturro
Lavinia Currier
Howard Kaminsky
Betsy Davidson Pickering
Barbara Van Dyke
Leslee Dart
Susan Kaminsky
Jonathan Reichman
Shelley Wanger
David M. Davis
Ron Kastner
Adam Rich
Bruce Weber
Nancy Dine
Tony Kiser
Carole Rifkind
George C. White
Arlene Donovan
Alan Klein
John Roche
Helen Whitney
Griffin Dunne
Jan Krukowski
Michael Roemer
Ealan Wingate
Richard Eaddy
Susan Lacy
Theodore C. Rogers
Irwin Young
Jill Fairchild
Rodger Larson
Robert Rosen
Susan Farkas
Lindsay Law
Richard Roth
Chairpersons are in bold.
Brenda Feigen
Stan Lawder
Paige Royer
Current board members in red.
Peter Feinstein
Richard Lorber, Current Chair
Michael Rudell
30
31
“Year after year, the Film Forum brilliantly goes about its job of programming new
documentaries, new animation, premieres of American, European, and Asian features,
as well as the most interesting revivals in the city.” – David Denby, New York Magazine (1989)
“NYC’s
finest
cinema”
PETER AARon/ESTO Photographics
– Entertainment
Weekly (2005)
“Even in its new,
comparatively classy home
on Watts Street, the Film
“The Film Forum that Miss Cooper
directs has expanded the city’s
cultural riches, earned the plaudits
of critics, surrounded the work of
independent filmmakers with an air
of excitement and introduced the
artistry of non-prominent filmmakers
to American audiences.”
– Lawrence Van Gelder, The New York Times (1982)
Forum continues to be
one of Manhattan’s most consistently rewarding showcases. Comfortable
seats and good projection need not announce a sellout to Philistine film tastes.”
– Vincent Canby, The New York TimeS (1982)
“You have made New York’s Film Forum a model for other
cinemas and cinematheques worldwide... You have created
one of the most respected venues in the world.”
“The city’s
hippest
and most
essential
art house”
209 West Houston Street, New York, NY 10014
■
TEL: (212) 627-2035 Box Office: (212) 727-8110
E-mail: [email protected]
www.filmforum.org
© The Moving Image, Inc. / Film Forum 2010 32
DESIGN: Gates Sisters Studio, Inc.
– Max Abelson,
The New York
Observer (2007)
– American Film Institute citation to Karen Cooper,
awarding her an honorary doctorate (1995)
“It is the only theater of its kind in the city, pursuing
a double policy of independent first-runs and
revivals. In the past decade I have seen more movies
that have left a permanent impression on me at
Film Forum than anywhere else.” - Luc Sante, Interview (1989)
“That appetite for adventurous programming and a willingness to live
with the consequences have helped make the Film Forum perhaps
the country’s most daring and ambitious presenter of independent,
foreign and repertory films, with an influence that reaches far beyond
New York City.” − William Grimes, The New York Times (1992)