New Yorker Films is an independent film distribution company founded by Daniel Talbot in 1965. It started as an extension of his

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

movie house, the New Yorker Theater, founded 1960, after a film's producer would not allow for a movie's single booking. It went out of business in 2009 and was revived the next year with its acquisition by Aladdin Distribution.

Background

Through New Yorker Films, Talbot aimed to import foreign films that were not otherwise available in the US market. His first acquisition for distribution was the

Bernardo Bertolucci Bernardo Bertolucci (; 16 March 1941 – 26 November 2018) was an Italian film director and screenwriter with a career that spanned 50 years. Considered one of the greatest directors in Italian cinema, Bertolucci's work achieved international ...

debut film ''

Before the Revolution ''Before the Revolution'' ( it, Prima della rivoluzione) is a 1964 Italian romantic drama film directed by Bernardo Bertolucci. It stars Adriana Asti and Francesco Barilli and is centred on "political and romantic uncertainty among the youth of ...

'' (1964). Other early acquisitions, such as Jean-Luc Godard's ''

Les Carabiniers ''The Carabineers'' (french: Les Carabiniers; 1963) was the fifth narrative feature film by French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard. Plot ''Les Carabiniers'' (1963) tells the story of two poor men called to serve in battle, lured by promises of the world' ...

'' (1963) and

Ousmane Sembène Ousmane Sembène (; 1 January 1923 or 8 January 1923 – 9 June 2007), often credited in the French style as Sembène Ousmane in articles and reference works, was a Senegalese film director, producer and writer. The ''Los Angeles Times'' consider ...

's ''

Black Girl Black women are women of sub-Saharan African and Afro-diasporic descent, as well as women of Australian Aboriginal and Melanesian descent. The term 'Black' is a racial classification of people, the definition of which has shifted over time and a ...

'' (1966), helped establish New Yorker Films as a presenter of innovative, artistically significant, and politically engaged films from around the world.

Titles introduced

Woody Boy press promo photo by Nancy Wong

New Yorker Films helped gain an audience for controversial and challenging works avoided by other distributors in the United States. Some of these included

Jacques Rivette Jacques Rivette (; 1 March 1928 – 29 January 2016) was a French film director and film critic most commonly associated with the French New Wave and the film magazine '' Cahiers du Cinéma''. He made twenty-nine films, including '' L'amour f ...

's '' Celine and Julie Go Boating'';

Wayne Wang Wayne Wang (; born January 12, 1949) is a Hong Kong–American director, producer, and screenwriter. Considered a pioneer of Asian-American cinema, he was one of the first Chinese-American filmmakers to gain a major foothold in Hollywood ...

's ''

Chan Is Missing ''Chan Is Missing'' is a 1982 American independent comedy-drama film produced and directed by Wayne Wang. The film, which is shot in black and white, is plotted as a mystery with noir undertones, and its title is a play on the Charlie Chan f ...

''; Chantal Akerman's ''

Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles ''Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles'' (, "Jeanne Dielman, 23 Commerce Quay, 1080 Brussels") is a 1975 drama film written and directed by Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman. It was filmed over five weeks on location in Brussels, ...

'';

Claude Lanzmann Claude Lanzmann (; 27 November 1925 – 5 July 2018) was a French filmmaker known for the Holocaust documentary film '' Shoah'' (1985). Early life Lanzmann was born on 27 November 1925 in Paris, France, the son of Paulette () and Armand Lanzmann. ...

's documentary ''

Shoah The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ar ...

'';

Emir Kusturica Emir Kusturica ( sr-cyrl, Емир Кустурица; born 24 November 1954) is a Serbian film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and musician. He also has French citizenship.http://www.serbia.com/emir-kusturica-artist-builder-and-anti-glo ...

's ''

Underground Underground most commonly refers to: * Subterranea (geography), the regions beneath the surface of the Earth Underground may also refer to: Places * The Underground (Boston), a music club in the Allston neighborhood of Boston * The Underground ...

''; the Merchant-Ivory docudrama ''

The Courtesans of Bombay ''The Courtesans of Bombay'' is a 1983 British docudrama directed by Ismail Merchant. A collaboration by Merchant, James Ivory, and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. The film focuses on a Bombay compound known as Pavan Pool, where women aspiring to work in ...

'';

Rainer Werner Fassbinder Rainer Werner Fassbinder (; 31 May 1945 – 10 June 1982), sometimes credited as R. W. Fassbinder, was a German filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the major figures and catalysts of the New German Cinema movement. Fassbinder's main ...

's ''

The Marriage of Maria Braun ''The Marriage of Maria Braun'' (german: Die Ehe der Maria Braun) is a 1978 West German drama film directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. The film stars Hanna Schygulla as Maria, whose marriage to the soldier Hermann remains unfulfilled due to Wor ...

'';

Werner Herzog Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with u ...

's ''

Aguirre, the Wrath of God ''Aguirre, the Wrath of God'' (; german: Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes; ) is a 1972 West German epic historical drama film produced, written and directed by Werner Herzog. Klaus Kinski stars in the title role of Spanish soldier Lope de Aguirre, w ...

''; and

Jean Eustache Jean Eustache (; 30 November 1938 – 5 November 1981) was a French filmmaker. During his short career, he completed numerous short films, in addition to a pair of highly regarded features, of which the first, ''The Mother and the Whore'', is c ...

's ''

The Mother and the Whore ''The Mother and the Whore'' (french: La maman et la putain) is a 1973 French film directed by Jean Eustache and starring Jean-Pierre Léaud, Bernadette Lafont and Françoise Lebrun. An examination of the relationships between three characters ...

''.

Trends introduced

New Yorker Films considered itself the primary force in introducing the United States to

New German Cinema New German Cinema (german: Neuer Deutscher Film) is a period in German cinema which lasted from 1962 to 1982, in which a new generation of directors emerged who, working with low budgets, and influenced by the French New Wave and Italian Neore ...

, the politically embattled

Latin American cinema Latin American cinema refers collectively to the film output and film industries of Latin America. Latin American film is both rich and diverse, but the main centers of production have been Argentina, Brazil and Mexico. Latin American cinema flou ...

, and the

postcolonial Postcolonialism is the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic legacy of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and exploitation of colonized people and their lands. More specifically, it is a ...

African cinema Cinema of Africa is both the history and present of the making or screening of films on the African continent, and also refers to the persons involved in this form of audiovisual culture. It dates back to the early 20th century, when film reels w ...

. It discovered the early breakthrough works of such now-celebrated

filmmakers Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, casti ...

Agnieszka Holland Agnieszka Holland (born 28 November 1948) is a Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej Wajda, ...

Juzo Itami , born , was a Japanese actor, screenwriter and film director. He directed eleven films (one short and ten features), all of which he wrote himself. Early life Itami was born Yoshihiro Ikeuchi in Kyoto. The name Itami was passed on from his fath ...

Errol Morris Errol Mark Morris (born February 5, 1948) is an American film director known for documentaries that interrogate the epistemology of its subjects. In 2003, his documentary film '' The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamar ...

, and

Zhang Yimou Zhang Yimou (; born 2 April 1950) is a Chinese film director, producer, writer, actor and former cinematographer.Tasker, Yvonne (2002). "Zhang Yimou" i''Fifty Contemporary Filmmakers'' Routledge Publishing, p. 412. . Google Book Search. Retriev ...

. Later it explored new frontiers in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

ian, Asian, and Eastern European cinema.

Non-theatrical market

New Yorker Films also serviced the non-theatrical market, catering to the specialized needs of film society and classroom venues not generally served by larger film providers. Th
New Yorker Films
library includes titles from leading independent and foreign film distributors such as

Sony Pictures Classics Sony Pictures Classics Inc. is an American film production and distribution company that is a division of Sony Pictures. It was founded in 1992 by former Orion Classics heads Michael Barker, Tom Bernard and Marcie Bloom. It distributes, produce ...

, First Look, and Lions Gate Entertainment.

Ownership by Madstone Films and Aladdin Distribution LLC

In 2002, New Yorker Films was acquired by Madstone Films. On February 23, 2009, New Yorker Films posted a notice on its Web site announcing it had gone out of business. An e-mail from company vice president José Lopez, published on the IndieWire news site, confirmed that the company's demise was the result of its parent company's defaulting on a loan. In February 2010, a year after it ceased operations, it was announced that Aladdin Distribution LLC, headed by Christopher Harbonville and David Raphel, had acquired the company and its library. Former vice president José Lopez was named president, and New Yorker Films officially restarted operations on March 8, 2010. Since the revival, its acquisitions have included ''My Dog Tulip'', ''Octubre'', ''Turn Me On, Dammit!'', and the re-release of Jacques Rivette's classic ''Celine and Julie Go Boating''.

End of the company

As of February 2018, the official company website NewYorkerFilms.com only has a placeholder image, and many of its DVDs have been out of print for at least a year.

References

External links

Official New Yorker Films websiteNew Yorker Films at the Internet Movie Database
{{Authority control Film distributors of the United States Entertainment companies established in 1965