Dooman River (China, Zhang Lu)

The  New Year opens a window onto the world as the 2011 Global Lens festival is again presented by New York's Museum of Modern Art and the Global Film Initiative (GFI).  The eighth annual touring film exhibition conceived to encourage filmmaking in countries with developing film communities will present nine films, each from a different country, which have received seed money from GFI. The series runs January 13–28, 2011 at the Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters of the Museum of Modern Art. 

This year’s selection includes: Federico Veiroj’s La Vida Útil (A Useful Life, Uruguay);  Sérgio Bianchi’s Os Inquilinos (The Tenants, Brazil); Sidharth Srinivasan’s Pairon Talle (Soul of Sand, India); Diego Lerman’s La Mirada Invisible (The Invisible Eye, Argentina); Aktan Arym Kubat’s Svet-Ake (The Light Thief, Kyrgyzstan); Mohammad Rasoulof’s Kestzar Haye Sepid (The White Meadows, Iran); Zhang Lu’s Dooman River (China) Levan Koguashvili’s Quchis Dgeebi (Street Days, Georgia); and Ahmed Imamovic’s Belvedere (Bosnia-Herzegovina). The series will also include two weeklong runs of the films La Vida Útil (A Useful Life, Uruguay) and Quchis Dgeebi (Street Days, Georgia).  

This illuminating cross-section of international cinema is deeply rooted in the social and political realities of the countries where their talented and resourceful makers live and set their stories. They provide the armchair traveler and the ambitious film buff with ideas to mull over and visuals to absorb. The series is organized by Jytte Jensen, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art. For more information, visit: http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/films/1136

Sandy Mandelberger, Film New York Editor