Look through just about any issue of The Village Voice from the 60s and 70s and you’ll inevitably stumble across pages upon pages of film listings and advertisements, ranging from European auteur classics, avant-garde experimentals, and art-house pornography. It was a clear sign of New York City’s newfound position as the world’s preeminent cinema city, with venues like the Bleecker Street Cinema and Anthology Film Archives becoming temples to filmic iconoclasm. Navigating New York’s labyrinthine art-house filmgoing scene became slightly less daunting with the advent of Screen Slate in 2011, which provides comprehensive listings and accompanying criticism for any and all of the city’s niche screenings. Nevertheless, it can still be a massive headache to find the best retrospective screenings within New York’s treasure trove of repertory theaters. So whether it be for a date night at the Metrograph, an educational trip to Anthology Film Archives, or just a quick day at the MoMA, What’s Old is New compiles all the essential programs and screenings to see in the upcoming month.
Graphic by Xanthe Massey
The Remembered Lives of G. Chaplin and Carlos Saura
Where to See: Metrograph
Long regarded as one of Spain’s most acclaimed directors, Carlos Saura made over 30 films spanning seven decades. His most prolific period in the 1960s and 70s, where he consistently skirted General Franco’s censorship in his filmmaking, coincided with a fruitful partnership with American actress Geraldine Chaplin. Across 12 years of collaboration, the two worked in tandem in order to create some of Spanish cinema’s greatest works. Early 60s works like the Vertigo-esque psychological thriller Peppermint Frappe and the road movie Stress is Three reveal radical countercultural sensibilities, while later post-Franco films like Elisa, My Life and Cria Cuervos employ techniques of magical realism in order to reckon with the national trauma of the Spanish civil war.
$18
Where to See: Metrograph
The magnificent auburn leaves of fall create the backdrop to all manner of emotional turmoil in this series, which gathers together the best of autumnal cinema. At center stage are Douglas Sirk’s resplendent class melodrama All That Heaven Allows, and one of its various remakes, Todd Haynes’ Far From Heaven, both of which utilize the deep colors of Northeast autumn to devastatingly beautiful effect. Late career masterworks by Yasujiro Ozu and Ingmar Bergman additionally prove the underlying emotional potency of the season, while Mabel Cheung’s New York via Hong Kong romance An Autumn’s Tale is as touching a fall-time story as any.
$18
Where to See: Anthology Film Archives
The second iteration of the series “Women, Workers, and Whores on Film”, which ran at Anthology Film Archives in April 2025, “Avatars of the Whore” is a further exploration into the complexities of sex work as seen through its depictions on screen. Across historical and geographical backgrounds, “Avatars of the Whore” primarily chronicles sex work as a means, never an end. The women in these films participate in sex work for things as varied as breaking a curse, negotiating childcare, and finding erotic self-discovery. The films in this series are set in 16th century India, 1950s Hong Kong, and German leather clubs, with characters ranging from dominatrixes to courtesans, creating a tapestry of sex work that accentuates its ambiguity.
$14 / $10 for Students
Where to See: Anthology Film Archives
This short series, divided into three programs of shorts, seeks to highlight various female-made animated shorts, many of which were either until recently lost to time or simply neglected. These range from fairytale adventures to educational videos. The first program is of child-friendly animations of the animal kingdom, including a short by famed German silhouette animator Lotte Reiniger. The other two programs are more complex, tackling various experiences of womanhood including motherhood, reproductive health, and meditations on existence.
$14 / $10 for Students
Where to See: Anthology Film Archives
Get ready for Halloween with a comprehensive retrospective of independent film company Troma Entertainment, which has been producing some of the goriest, funniest schlock in cinema since 1974. Founded by Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Herz, who will both be in attendance in addition to various cast and crew for Q&A’s, Troma is known for such tasteless cult hits as The Toxic Avenger, Tromeo and Juliet, and Poultrygeist: The Night of the Chicken Dead. Loved by Anthology Film Archives founder Jonas Mekas for a “gleefully transgressive [and] anti-bourgeois” method of filmmaking, “Troma-Geddon” also allows for the viewer to think about the ragtag, B-movie filmmaking of Troma in relationship to the scrappy provocation of the 1960s New York avant-garde. There will be much blood, practical effects, and musical numbers.
$14 / $10 for Students
Where to See: Film Forum
Best known for his hugely influential meta-docu-fiction hybrid Symbiopsychotaxiplasm Take One, William Greaves was one of the preeminent documentarians of the 20th century. In celebration of his centennial, as well as the release of the recently unearthed documentary Once Upon A Time In Harlem, Film Forum is paying tribute with a retrospective of some of Greaves’ greatest work. These works range from experimental meta-pieces like Symbiopsychotaxiplasm Takes One and Two, PBS documentaries for the program Black Journal concerning black history and civil rights, and cinema verite works like the aforementioned Once Upon A Time In Harlem, which documented a party Greaves threw in 1972 with all the surviving members of the Harlem Renaissance.
$17
Where to See: Film Forum
Yet another centennial celebration, Film Forum is presenting a 25 film retrospective of films by Andrzej Wajda, one of the greatest Polish directors of all time. Best known for his war trilogy, made up of the films A Generation, Kanał, and his most well-known film, Ashes and Diamonds, Wajda was known for complex studies of Polish identity, especially in relation to the trauma of World War II. This series features new 4K restorations of his war trilogy, as well as other films like Man of Marble and Korczak.
$17
The Gospel According to Ken Russell
Where to See: IFC Center
In celebration of the 4K rerelease of one of the most controversial films of all time, 1971’s The Devils, IFC is putting a spotlight on its maverick director, Ken Russell. An iconoclastic director like no other, Russell’s often maximalist and hypersexual films have largely become cult classics. This series includes his various unconventional musical films, ranging from the Tchaikovsky biopic The Music Lovers to his splendid filmic reimaging of the Who’s rock opera Tommy. There are additionally various screenings of his cult hits including Crimes of Passion, Altered States, and the D.H. Lawrence adaptation Women in Love.
$18
Where to See: MoMA
Following MoMA’s all-encompassing retrospective of Chantal Akerman last fall comes a just as comprehensive retrospective of one of her closest collaborators, editor Claire Atherton. Having begun working with Akerman in the 1980s on films such as Letters Home, Atherton’s sculptural editing resonates throughout Akerman documentaries such as From the East and South. The series also features Atherton’s work with directors like Wang Bing and Eric Baudelaire. Atherton will introduce all screenings in person.
$14 / $12 for students / Free for Students via Rush at the box office