MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE

New York’s revamped Museum of the Moving Image is reopening its doors on January 15, 2011. As unveiled earlier this year by indieWIRE, the Museum will feature a new 267-seat theater, 68-seat screening room, a number of new galleries, and a collection of screening spaces for video art.

“There is going to be something for everyone during the opening celebrations for Museum of the Moving Image,” Museum Director Rochelle Slovin said in a statement. “From connoisseurs of classic cinema to fans of video games and current TV, from children and their families to New York’s new-media artists. We welcome audiences from all around New York and all around the world to our transformed Museum, which has been so brilliantly designed by Thomas Leeser.”

Celebrations will kick-off with six weeks of inaugural programs in honor of screen culture titled Celebrating the Moving Image. The opening weekend will offer 70mm screenings of Jacques Tati’s “Playtime” and Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Also in the inaugural schedule are screenings of Marcel L’Herbier’s silent-era classic “L’Argent” (with live musical accompaniment from the Mont Alto Orchestra), a screening of John Ford’s recently rediscovered “Upstream,” and a special presentation of Manoel de Oliveira’s “Doomed Love.”

International cinema will receive a spotlight at the Museum with special series like Indian Cinema Showcase and Korean Cinema Now. Avant-garde cinema will also get (much-warranted) attention, with a rare screening of Gregory Markopoulos’s “Eniaios: Cycle Five,” a section of the experimental auteur’s 80-hour-long epic. This marks a good opportunity to see the avant-garde film, which is usually only available in select seasonal screenings in an outdoor venue in rural Greece.

Weekend family matinees and special programs on television will also be part of the slate. David Schwartz, the Museum’s Chief Curator, commented on this eclectic and near-comprehensive focus in a stament, “The opening programs reflect the Museum’s wide scope of programming, encompassing silent films with live music, classic Hollywood cinema, avant-garde film, television, contemporary world cinema, and more. Films will always be shown in the highest quality formats possible. We are opening with a series of restored films from archives around the world, and Celebrating the Moving Image will offer the public many unforgettable experiences.”