NEW YORK – After a year without cinemas in New York City, independent movie theater owner Nicolas Nicolaou has enlisted the help of his good friend the award-winning director Abel Ferrara to jump-start the re-opening of Cinema Village – now in its 58th year of operation – for a week-long retrospective and tribute to movie-going running next Wednesday, June 30-Thursday, July 8.

Filmgoers are invited to join in celebrating a special screening of Ferrara’s newest film Siberia (Lionsgate), starring Willem Dafoe, alongside the New York theatrical premiere of The Projectionist (Kino Lorber) a love letter to legendary New York City indie cinema impresario Nicolas Nicolaou himself and his four-decade legacy of operating the city’s most distinct neighborhood theaters. Greek-Cypriot Nicolaou currently owns and operates Cinema Village in Manhattan, Alpine Cinemas in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, and Cinemart in Forest Hills, Queens.

Ferrara will be introducing an array of his films, new and old, including Pasolini, 4:44 Last Day on Earth, Tomasso, MS.45 and Driller Killer, plus he will participate in a live music performance alongside his longtime collaborator and composer Joe Delia. Also screening during the week will be films that Ferrara holds close to his heart – ones that he watched at Cinema Village over the years.

With a reputation as a director of controversial cinema, Abel Ferrara moves into his fourth decade of filmmaking with continued work in the U.S. as well as European projects. Born in the Bronx in 1951, Ferrara started on Super 8 in his teens in upstate New York with writers Nicholas St. John and John McIntyre. His first features were Driller Killer and MS. 45 in the late 70s. The 80s and 90s led to a cult reputation with legendary films like The King of New York, Bad Lieutenant, The Addiction, and The Funeral.

Built in 1963 in the shell of a turn of the century fire station, Cinema Village is the oldest continuously operated cinema in Greenwich Village and one of the oldest continuously operated art cinemas in New York City. More info about Cinema Village is available here.

Cinema Village is located at 22 East 12th Street, New York, NY 10003. Tickets may be purchased in advance at cinemavillage.com or in-person at the box office.

‘ABEL FERRARA’S CINEMA VILLAGE’

Program listed in alphabetical order

4:44 LAST DAY ON EARTH

82 min

Synopsis: In a large apartment high above the city lives our couple. They're in love. Skye (Shanyn Leigh) is a painter, Cisco (Willem Dafoe) is a successful actor. Just a normal afternoon – except that this isn't a normal afternoon, for them or anyone else. Because tomorrow, at 4:44 am, give or take a few seconds, the world will come to an end far more rapidly than even the worst doomsayer could have imagined. The final meltdown will come not without warnings, but with no means of escape. There will be no survivors. As always, there are those who, as their last cigarette is being lit and the blindfold tightened, will still hope against hope for some kind of reprieve. For a miracle. Not our two lovers. They – like the majority of the Earth's population – have accepted their fate: the world is going to end. Starring: Willem Dafoe and Shanyn Leigh.

THE DRILLER KILLER

101 min

Synopsis: An artist slowly goes insane from struggling to pay his bills, work on his paintings and care for his two female roommates. This leads him to the streets of New York after dark where he randomly kills derelicts with a power drill. Starring Ferrara (Jimmy Laine), Carolyn Marz, Baybi Day, and Harry Schultz.

MS. 45

80 min

Synopsis: A timid and mute seamstress goes insane after being attacked and raped twice in one day, in which she takes to the streets of New York City after dark and randomly shoots men with a .45 caliber pistol. Starring: Zoë Lund, Bogey, and Albert Sinkys.

PASOLINI

Kino Lorber

84 min

Synopsis: A kaleidoscopic look at the last day of Italian filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini in 1975. Starring: Willem Dafoe, Ninetto Davoli, Riccardo Scamarcio

https://www.cinemavillage.com/Now-Playing/pasolini-1.html

THE PROJECTIONIST

Kino Lorber

81 min

Synopsis: The Projectionist, by Abel Ferrara, the director of controversial cinema,  traces the life and livelihood of  friend and fellow cinephile Nicolas “Nick” Nicolaou, a Cypriot immigrant who moved to America as a young boy and began working as a teenager in a small neighborhood movie theaters around Manhattan, defying gentrification, changing viewing habits and corporate dominance in the 1980’s, only to emerge decades later as one of New York City’s last independent theater owners (he currently operates Manhattan’s Cinema Village, Bay Ridge’s Alpine Cinemas and Forest Hills’ Cinemart). At once a walking tour of New York City’s evolving theatrical landscape, a history of movie-going over the last 50 years, and a moving tribute to friendship, tenacity and movie love, The Projectionist is an indelible tribute and timely paean to what going to the movies is all about. Starring: Abel Ferrara and Nicolas Nicolaou.

https://www.cinemavillage.com/Now-Playing/the-projectionist.html

SIBERIA

Lionsgate

92 min

Synopsis: Clint is a damaged man who has retreated to a wintry remote mountain cabin where he hopes to find serenity. He runs a modest cafe where the rare traveler or native of the region visits. But even in his relative isolation he cannot find peace nor escape. On a fateful evening, to confront himself, he begins a journey by dogsled to the world he once knew. He travels through dreams, memory and imagination in an attempt to find his true nature. Starring: Willem Dafoe.

https://www.lionsgate.com/movies/siberia

TOMMASO

Kino Lorber

115 min

Synopsis: The story of an American artist living in Rome with his young European wife Nikki and their 3-year-old daughter, Dee Dee. Starring: Willem Dafoe, Cristina Chiriac, and Anna Ferrara.

https://www.cinemavillage.com/Now-Playing/tommaso.html