63rd New York Film Festival: Biopics, New Filmmakers, & More

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Wednesday, 13 August 2025 14:16

Written by Brad Balfour

Lincoln Center’s massive cinema showcase, the New York Film Festival, returns for its 63d instalment September 26 to October 13. The Spotlight portion of the festival showcases films about great creative minds from great directors: Richard Linklater’s Blue Moon about a night in the life of lyricist Lorenz Hart and Nouvelle Vague, a film set during the production of Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless. Mr. Scorsese from Rebecca Miller is a five part chronicle of the life of Martin Scorsese told through interviews and archival footage. From Ben Stiller comes a film about the lives of his comedian parents, Stiller & Meara: Nothing Is Lost. The Spotlight Gala selection is Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere, Scott Cooper’s biographical drama that captures the early-’80s period when Bruce Springsteen created the raw, acoustic songs that became his landmark album Nebraska.

With a focus on new and adventurous voices in international filmmaking, the Currents slate includes 16 feature films and 24 short films in five programs, representing 28 countries. The Currents Centerpiece selection is the U.S. premiere of Mare’s Nest by Ben Rivers (Two Years at Sea which screened at NYFF49), an enigmatic road movie set in a post-apocalyptic world ruled by children. 

“In a film landscape that is so often homogeneous by design, this year’s Currents lineup is energizing for being a showcase of the boundless possibilities of cinematic language,” said Dennis Lim, Artistic Director, New York Film Festival. “Resurrecting old technologies and subverting new ones, the filmmakers and artists here use an ingenious array of styles and forms to investigate the past and illuminate the present, in the process reminding us of all that cinema can do.”

Also part of the festival is Jim Jarmusch’s Father Mother Sister Brother as the Centerpiece Selection, Bradley Cooper’s Is This Thing On? and Anemone, which features Daniel Day-Lewis in his first on-screen performance in eight years.

To learn more, go to: https://www.filmlinc.org/nyff/ 

63rd New York Film Festival
September 26 - October 13, 2025

Lincoln Center and Other Venues in NYC

Music & Film Come Together at LIMEHOF Music Documentary Film Festival

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Wednesday, 06 August 2025 09:48

Written by Brad Balfour

The Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame (LIMEHOF) in Stony Brook, New York is bringing together film and music with the LIMEHOF Music Documentary Film Festival. Running August 8 - 10 the festival features 24 music documentary films to screen, featuring The Beatles, Harry Chapin, Zombies, Steppenwolf, Public Enemy, Ron Delsener, Garland Jeffreys, and many more. These films come from around the world and embody musical genres such as classical, hip-hop, rock, jazz, ska, blues and folk, and many others. 

One of the opening day’s short films is Coming Home: The Guggenheim Grotto Back in Ireland. Director and actor Will Chase, producer Deborah Lopez and singer Ingrid Michaelson are expected to attend. This Q&A is expected to be followed by a live music performance by Mick Lynch. Director Robert McCullough Jr. and members of the Bronx Boys Wrecking Crew are expected to attend the screening of The Bronx Boys – The Evolution of B-Boy Culture. To My Rescue, It Was The S1Ws (A Public Enemy Story) will also screen, with director Janol Ture and Hip-Hop Legend DJ Johnny Juice (Public Enemy), who will join the Q&As and perform live following both films. The closing night spotlight film is Hung Up on a Dream: The Zombies Documentary.

“This music documentary film festival is the perfect way to extend the mission of the Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame—to preserve the past, celebrate the present, and ignite a love for music in future generations,” said LIMEHOF Vice Chairman Tom Needham who is organizing the film festival as Executive Director with film festival Artistic Director Wendy Feinberg.

To learn more, go to: https://www.limusichalloffame.org/limehof-music-documentary-film-festival/

LIMEHOF Music Documentary Film Festival
August 8 - 10, 2025

Long Island Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame
97 Main Street
Stony Brook, NY 11790

48th Asian American International Film Festival: Infidelity, Identity, & Adventure

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Thursday, 31 July 2025 10:40

Written by Brad Balfour

Now in its 48th edition, the Asian American International Film Festival (AAIFF) brings bold and exciting voices from across the Asian diaspora to theaters in NYC from July 31st to August 10th. From medical dramas, to family stories, to classic super heroes, the AAIFF features an exciting mix of stories with documentaries, shorts, features, and special screenings.

Derided for decades as one of the lesser superhero movies, Albert Pyun’s (Cyborg) director's cut of his 1990 Captain America film has been uncovered so his true vision can be shown to the world. Mistress Dispeller is a documentary that follows a real, unfolding case of infidelity as Teacher Wang, the titular Mistress Dispeller whose job it is to repair marriages, attempts to bring a couple back from the edge of crisis. Their story shifts our sympathies between husband, wife, and mistress to explore the ways emotion, pragmatism, and cultural norms collide to shape romantic relationships in contemporary China. Moloka’i Bound, directed by Alika Tengan, is the closing film of the festival and follows Kainoa De Silva, a wayward Hawaiian man, who is on parole and committed to reconnecting with his family. Most important to Kainoa is rebuilding his relationship with his adolescent son, Jonathan, after years of being incarcerated. But acclimating to a normal life in Hawai’i is harder than it seems and Kainoa tends to do all the wrong things for the right reasons. In trying to prove himself worthy of his family and his native heritage, Kainoa’s journey is a story of both reconciliation and redemption. Following the screening will be a reception at Downtown Social (149 2nd Ave, New York, NY 10003). 

The festival also includes panels and workshops on screenwriting, navigating mental health in creative fields, documentary distribution, and more.

Established in 1978 by Asian CineVision, the Asian American International Film Festival is the nation’s first and longest running festival of its kind and the premier showcase for the best independent Asian, Asian diaspora and Pacific Islander cinema. AAIFF is committed to film and media as a tool for social change and to supporting diversity and inclusion in the media arts.

To learn more, go to: https://www.aaiff.org/

Asian American International Film Festival
July 31 - August 10, 2025

Various Venues in NYC