Film at Lincoln Center expands window on Italian cinema

For 25 years, Film at Lincoln Center has quietly built one of New York’s most reliable windows into contemporary Italian cinema. This spring, that window opens a little wider.

The anniversary edition of “Open Roads: New Italian Cinema” returns from May 28 through June 4, bringing 15 films that feel less like a survey and more like a statement: Italian cinema is not looking back — it’s pushing forward.

There is history here, too. A tribute to Roberto Rossellini, anchored by a screening of “Paisan,” reminds audiences where much of modern filmmaking learned to breathe. The real energy, though, is with the new work: films that are restless, intimate, and unafraid to get uncomfortable.

The opening-night selection, “The Kidnapping of Arabella,” sets the tone: strange, funny, and emotionally sharp. Throughout the lineup, stories of sisterhood, identity, desire, and ambition unfold without neat resolutions. These films lean into contradiction. They sit in it.

Even when the settings shift, from 18th-century Venice to the late-20th-century Italian coast, the tension feels immediate. Relationships strain. Power moves. People take risks they don’t fully understand.

A documentary portrait, “Roberto Rossellini: Living Without a Script,” rounds out the tribute, tracing a filmmaker who never stayed still for long.

Tickets go on sale May 1.

Films & descriptions

All films will be screened at the Walter Reade Theater (165 W. 65th Street).

Opening night

• “The Kidnapping of Arabella”/“Il rapimento di Arabella” — A woman becomes convinced a young girl is her past self, setting off a strange, funny, and reflective journey.
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Additional films

• “A Brief Affair”/“Breve storia d’amore” — Infidelity and therapy collide in a sharp, modern comedy.

• “Agnus Dei” — A quiet documentary captures a sacred ritual behind papal tradition.

• “Elisa” — A woman confronts memory and guilt after being convicted of killing her sister.

• “The Eyes of Others”/“Gli occhi degli altri” — Desire and power twist into something darker among the elite.

• “Fuori” — Three women bond in prison and struggle to hold that connection outside.

• “I Want Her Dead”/“Il quieto vivere” — A decades-long family feud is shown through hybrid storytelling.

• “La gioia” — A teacher and student form a relationship with complicated consequences.

• “Mosquitoes / Le bambine” — A fragile girlhood friendship unfolds over one summer.

• “My Tennis Maestro/“Il maestro” — A young athlete and his coach navigate pressure and identity.

• “Orfeo” —Love, loss, and the underworld take a stylized descent.

• “Primavera” — A young musician’s life shifts under the influence of Vivaldi.

• “Roberto Rossellini, Living Without a Script”/“Roberto Rossellini, Più di una Vita” — A portrait presents a director in constant reinvention.

• “A Year of School”/“Un anno di scuola” — A teenage girl challenges the space she enters.

Special screening

• “Paisan”/“Paísa” — Rossellini provides a landmark portrait of wartime Italy.

Additional information:

https://www.filmlinc.org/festivals/open-roads-new-italian-cinema/.