NEW YORK.- MoMA Presents, an initiative launched earlier this year that brings weeklong runs of new and newly rediscovered feature films to The Museum of Modern Art, continues in September with extended runs of new films by Todd McCarthy (Pierre Rissient: Man of Cinema), Béla Tarr (The Man from London), and Carlos Reygadas (Silent Light). All three films are receiving their first American theatrical presentations after having been screened at major international film festivals such as Cannes and the New York Film Festival.

Todd McCarthy’s Pierre Rissient: Man of Cinema (2007), a dramatic and rousing portrait of filmmaker, film programmer, and cinephile Pierre Rissient, a pivotal figure in the international film community since the 1950s, runs from September 18 through 24. One of the critically acclaimed films at Cannes in 2007, the documentary illustrates the many and varied accomplishments of one of the world’s most influential film fans, whose efforts brought such filmmakers as Abbas Kiarostami, Clint Eastwood, and Jane Campion to the international spotlight. It is accompanied by From the Archives, A Pierre Rissient Selection, seven films from MoMA’s collection that inform an understanding of Rissient’s career, including a rare screening of Rissient’s own film Cinq et le Peau (1982), from September 18 through 21, 2008. Both exhibitions are organized by Laurence Kardish, Senior Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art.

Béla Tarr’s The Man from London (2007) is the North American premiere of the French/English release of the haunting feature based on the popular crime novel L’Homme de Londres by Georges Simenon. Tarr, one of contemporary filmmaking's international masters, uses his signature inventive filmmaking to translate a popular crime story to the big screen. The film sets a shady transaction, a murder, and the discovery of a suitcase full of money amidst the rainy nighttime streets of a small town, perfectly capturing an atmosphere of dread, entrapment, and moral ambiguity. Running September 22 through 28, it is organized by Jytte Jensen, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art.

Carlos Reygadas’ Silent Light (2007), running September 24 through 29, frames the story of one man’s inescapable love for two women, and the spiritual crises and redemption that follow. Set among a group of pacifist Mennonites residing in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, its emotional authenticity is underscored by a cast of Mennonite non-actors, who appear to live and breathe the deep convictions of their faith and traditions, lending a documentary-like feel and a metaphysical dimension to the work. MoMA Presents: Reygadas: Silent Light is part of a Filmmaker in Focus presentation that also includes a Reygadas retrospective (including rarely seen early shorts and all his 3 features) and two accompanying screenings of Carl Th. Dreyer's Ordet (1955), a work that clearly inspired Silent Light and is being offered as a further insight into the filmmaker's working aesthetic. Organized by Jytte Jensen, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art.