Rooftop Films Summer Series returns with more than 40 outdoor screenings featuring new independent feature films, short film programs, from June 17th through mid-September. Keeping with a 25-year long tradition, the Summer Series will open with a collection of new short films on Thursday, June 17th, at Green-Wood Cemetery.

Programming highlights include the NY premiere of Janicza Bravo’s Zola, presented by A24 on the lawn in Fort Greene Park; NY premieres of exceptional new documentaries, including Joshua Rofé’s Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal and Greed, and Sally Aitken’s Playing with Sharks; and special screenings of new festival favorites from around the world, including Amalia Ulman’s El Planeta, Natalie Morales’ Language Lessons, Graham Mason’s Inspector Ike, Aneil Karia’s Surge, Todd Stephens’ Swan Song, Salomé Jashi’s Taming the Garden, and many more.

“Last year, Rooftop Films was able to create drive-in venues across New York City and present more than 150 outdoor events – but nothing replaces the experience of being seated together in a crowd, watching a film that transports us to another place and reminds us that we are very much not alone,” said Dan Nuxoll, President of Rooftop Films. “As we selected the films for this year’s Summer Series, we sought out bold new works that focus the beams of light shining through the darkness, capture the celebrations that became acts of resistance, and depict the happy accidents that only come about when we gather as one.”

2021 Rooftop Films Summer Series Programming

651 ARTS Presents Juneteenth Celebration: (RE)VISION Co-presented in association with Downtown Brooklyn Partnership and Rooftop Films
June 18th and June 19th at the Plaza at 300 Ashland
This inaugural Juneteenth Celebration features a weekend of live “silent” outdoor film screenings (headsets to be provided) highlighting films that look through the lens of futurism and movement to illuminate stories about the Black perspective and the Black experience in America. With pre-show music provided by Soho House resident DJ Qool DJ Marv.

All Light, Everywhere
(dir. Theo Anthony | Documentary Feature | USA | 109 mins | Courtesy of NEON. Co-presented by Museum of the Moving Image and New York Hall of Science)

Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal and Greed
(dir. Joshua Rofé | Documentary Feature | USA | 92 mins | Courtesy of Netflix)

El Planeta
(dir. Amalia Ulman | Fiction Feature | Spain | 79 mins | Courtesy of Utopia. Co-presented by Festival Rizoma)

Fagara
(dir. Heiward Mak | Fiction Feature | Hong Kong | 120 mins. Free community screening co-presented with the Fort Greene Park Conservancy )

Inspector Ike
(dir. Graham Mason | Fiction Feature | USA | 84 mins | Courtesy of Factory 25)

Language Lessons
(dir. Natalie Morales, written by Mark Duplass and Natalie Morales | Fiction Feature | USA | 91 mins | Courtesy of Shout! Studios and Duplass Brothers Productions)

Los Lobos
(dir. Samuel Kishi Leopo | Fiction Feature | Mexico | 95 mins | Courtesy of FiGa Films. Free community screening co-presented with the Fort Greene Park Conservancy)

Not Going Quietly
(dir. Nicholas Bruckman | Documentary Feature | USA | 96 mins | Courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment)

October Country (with Live Score)
July 19th in Green-Wood Cemetery
(dir. Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher | Documentary Feature | USA | 80 mins | Courtesy of Oscilloscope. Co-presented with Museum of the Moving Image)

Once Upon a Time in Queens
(dir. Nick Davis | Documentary Series | USA | Courtesy of ESPN Films)

Playing with Sharks
(dir. Sally Aitken | Documentary Feature | Australia | 90 mins | Courtesy of National Geographic Documentary Films)

Surge
(dir. Aneil Karia | Fiction Feature | UK | 105 mins | Courtesy of FilmRise)

Swan Song
(dir. Todd Stephens | Fiction Feature | USA | 105 mins | Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures)

The Last Days of Gilda (Os últimos dias de Gilda)
(dir. Gustavo Pizzi | Fiction Series | Brazil | 105 mins )

Taming the Garden
(dir. Salomé Jashi | Documentary Feature | Switzerland, Germany, Georgia | 92 mins )

This is What We Mean By Short Films
Opening Night Short Film Program
June 17th at Green-Wood Cemetery
Films Include

• Audible, dir. Matt Ogens | USA | 39 mins | Courtesy of Netflix
• Calabasas 1/26/20, dir. Xavier Rotnofsky | USA | 11 mins
• Liberty, dir. Faren Humes | USA | 17 mins
• Melting Snow, dir. Janah Elise, Sue Ariza | USA | 9 mins
• Moving, dir. Adinah Dancyger | USA | 8 mins
• Pussymask, dir. Leah Shore | USA | 3 mins
• Writing on the Wall, dir. Miya Lee | USA | 6 mins

Topside
(dir. Logan George, Celine Held | Fiction Feature | USA | 90 mins )

We Are the Thousand
(dir. Anita Rivaroli | Documentary Feature | Italy | 80 mins )

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair
June 22nd at New York Hall of Science
(dir. Jane Schoenbrun | Fiction Feature | USA | 86 mins | Courtesy of Utopia. Presented in partnership with Museum of the Moving Image and New York Hall of Science)

Zola
June 24th in Fort Greene Park
(dir. Janicza Bravo | Fiction Feature | USA | 90 mins. Courtesy of A24)