Surf Wiki
Save to docs
geography/united-states

From Surf Wiki (app.surf) — the open knowledge base

Film Forum

Movie theater in Manhattan, New York

Film Forum

Movie theater in Manhattan, New York

The exterior of the theater in 2019

The Film Forum is a nonprofit movie theater at 209 West Houston Street in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City. It is a four-screen cinema open 365 days a year, with up to 250,000 annual admissions, nearly 500 seats, 60 employees, over 6,500 members, and an operating budget of $7 million. It is the only autonomous nonprofit cinema in New York City and one of the few in the United States.

History

It began in 1970 as an alternative screening space for independent films, with 50 folding chairs, one projector and a $19,000 annual budget. Karen Cooper became director in 1972. Its current Greenwich Village cinema (on Houston Street, west of Sixth Avenue) was built in 1990. In 1994, the Film Forum was honored with a Village Award by the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, even though it is technically in SoHo.

In 2018, the Film Forum had a major renovation, adding new seats (and in turn, more leg room) and a fourth theater. In 2023, it was announced that Cooper would step down from her position and she will be succeeded by the theater's deputy director, Sonya Chung.

Programming

Film Forum presents two distinct film programs: premieres of American independents and foreign art films, programmed by Karen Cooper, Mike Maggiore, and Sonya Chung, and repertory programming, which includes foreign and American classics, genre works, festivals, and directors' retrospectives, programmed by Bruce Goldstein.

Reputation

Filmmakers such as Agnès Varda, D. A. Pennebaker, Christopher Nolan, Kelly Reichardt, Ramin Bahrani and many others have praised the theater and its programming. Actor Ethan Hawke said in a 2018 testimonial that "part of what I love about Film Forum is that you can trust them. They will leave you better than you came". Director and actor André Gregory said in 2022, "If New York lost the Statue of Liberty, it would not be a real loss, but if Film Forum disappeared, it would be absolutely heartbreaking."

References

References

  1. "Film Forum · General Information".
  2. "Past Village Award Winners".
  3. Goldsmith, Jill. (January 9, 2023). "Film Forum Director Karen Cooper To Step Down After 50 Years At Helm Of The NYC Indie Cinema; Deputy Director Sonya Chung To Succeed Her".
  4. (July 31, 2018). "How Influential Is Film Forum? Christopher Nolan and Others Explain".
  5. Film Forum. (2018-12-05). "Ethan Hawke talks about Film Forum".
  6. (March 30, 2022). "How Film Forum Became the Best Little Movie House in New York".
Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

1970-establishments-in-new-york-city cinemas-and-movie-theaters-in-manhattan repertory-cinemas-in-the-united-states greenwich-village
Want to explore this topic further?

Ask Mako anything about Film Forum — get instant answers, deeper analysis, and related topics.

Research with Mako

Free with your Surf account

Content sourced from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This content may have been generated or modified by AI. CloudSurf Software LLC is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of AI-generated content. Always verify important information from primary sources.

Report