Rice Cinema

Rice Cinema operates during the academic year screening films almost every weekend. To find out what is playing, look online at http://cinema.rice.edu/

Since 1970, Rice Cinema has continued to screen films from around the world—foreign features, shorts, documentaries, and animation. Rice Cinema reaches beyond the university's hedges to the diverse communities of Houston. We offer a living alternative to the monolithic commercial cinema of Hollywood and have screened films from every continent. Among the internationally known filmmakers who have a

ppeared on our campus over the years include Roberto Rossalini, Werner Herzog, Rakhshan Banietemad, Atom Egoyan, Shirin Neshat, Spike Lee, Martin Scorsese, Andy Warhol, Jean-Luc Godard, George Lucas, Stan Brakage, Les Blank, Arturo Ripstein, Fernando E. Solanas, Albert Maysles, Patricio Guzman, Lordes Portio and Dennis Hopper. Rice Cinema works in concert with our academic programs to enrich our students' undergraduate experience. Our film students are provided state-of-the-art screening facilities to examine and study the historical and methodological aspects of movies from around the world in 16, 35 millimeter or digital 4K with Dolby Digital Sound. Film production students can showcase their work during the academic year on our new silver screen in recently renovated projection facilities. Come experience art at 24 frames per second at the Rice Cinema. To find out what is playing, look online at http://cinema.rice.edu or call the informational telephone line at 713-348-4853

05/17/2024

We hope everyone is doing well after the severe weather yesterday.

Rice Cinema is pleased to announce that the 17th annual Palestine Film Festival will move forward as scheduled; however, we encourage attendees to exercise caution and plan ahead, checking that roads and paths are clear and accessible prior to leaving their homes.

All screenings will take place at Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall room 301, commencing this evening with opening remarks at 6:30 p.m. by festival president Ahmed Ghoneim as well as artist director Ola Al Sheikh, followed by a performance by the Al-Zaytouna Band.

The film festival is taking place May 17–19, showcasing a variety of narrative, documentary, and short films. To purchase tickets or to learn more visit HPFF.org

Friday, May 17:
7:00 PM
“Bye Bye Tiberias”
Directed by Lina Soualem
(Palestine, 2023, 82 min.)
Preceded by short film “The Key”

Saturday, May 18:
12:00 PM
“Three Promises”
Directed by Yousef Srouji
(Palestine, 2023, 61 min.)
Saturday, May 18 12:00 PM
Preceded by the short film “Zoo”

3:00 PM
“Inshallah a Boy”
Directed by Amjad Al Rasheed
(Jordan, 2023, 113 min.)
Preceded by short film “Hamza: Chasing the Ghost Chasing Me”

7:00 PM
“The Teacher”
Directed by Farah Nabulsi
(UK/Palestine, 2023, 115 min.)
Saturday, May 18 at 7:00 PM
Preceded by short film “Trying to Survive”

Sunday, May 19:
3:00 PM
“A House in Jerusalem”
Directed by Muayad Alayan
(Palestine, 2023, 103 min.)
Preceded by short film “Mar Mama”

7:00 PM
“Lyd”
Directed by Sarah Ema Friedland and Rami Younis
(Palestine, 2023, 78 min.)
Preceded by short film “An Orange from Jaffa”

To learn more visit HPFF.org or cinema.rice.edu.

Tickets are $10 and can be purchased at HPFF.org

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court Visitor lot at a flat rate of $6, credit or debt card required.

03/21/2024

Join us TOMORROW for 'We Have Not Come Here to Die'! Followed by a virtual Q&A with the director Deepa Dhanraj!

Directed by Deepa Dhanraj
(India, 2018, 110 min.)

Friday, March 22, 6 pm (special time)
RSVP Link is below

Rohith Vemula, a Dalit Ph.D. research scholar and activist at University of Hyderabad who was persecuted by the university administration and Hindu supremacists, died of su***de on January 17, 2016. His su***de note, which argued against the “value of a man being reduced to his immediate identity” galvanized student politics and solidarity movements. The ensuing outrage gave rise to protests across India, calling the neglectful treatment and systemic oppression faced by Dalit people into question, and encouraging solidarity with minority groups facing similar discrimination from Hindu nationalists, students, administration, and aligned governing authorities. The film attempts to track this historic movement that is changing the conversation on caste in India.

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About the director: Deepa Dhanraj

A writer and award-winning filmmaker, Deepa Dhanraj has been actively involved in the women's movement – with a focus on political participation, health, and education – for more than four decades. She was one of the founding members of Yugantar, a feminist film collective that produced pioneering films about women's labor and resistance to domestic violence. Working through feminist politics, her extensive filmography spans three decades covering films on the violence and coercion of population control programs, Muslim women's courts that offer petitioners an alternative to patriarchal verdicts issued by Sharia courts, and the rise of Hindu majoritarianism. She has a special interest in education and she has worked extensively with government schools to create pedagogy suited to problems faced by first-generation learners who come from Dalit and Adivasi communities. She also teaches video production to women activists and regularly lectures on media theory in both academic and public settings.

See the full program for the Glorious Things films series here.
Discounted parking is available at Founder’s Court, at a flat rate of $6, credit card is required.
Open to the public.
Free

11/30/2023

Join us this week for the 'Once I Moved Like The Wind: Geronimo's Final Surrender' presented by Rice Cinema.

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ONCE I MOVED LIKE THE WIND: Geronimo’s final surrender to the American Empire
Parts II & III
(US, 90 min)
Directed by: Brian Huberman & Ed Hugetz
Reception in Welcome Center Foyer at 6:00 PM
Screening at 7:00 PM
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Directors present for Q&A post-screening.

In parts two and three the filmmakers seek a passage to Skeleton Canyon, Arizona, a sacred place where Geronimo surrendered to the American Empire for the last time.

Meanwhile, empire-building spread across the world, and in 1879 the British issued an ultimatum to the Zulus at the Tugela River then invaded and confronted a Zulu Impi of 30,000 warriors beneath the ancient mountain of Isandhlwana.

A Vietnam Vet with PTSD, who has moved to New Mexico to learn about the Apaches and to
heal himself, joins the film as a guide through Apacheria.

Lt. Charles Gatewood of the 6th Cavalry writes a memoir about his adventures with the Apaches as he works to track down Geronimo through the wilds of Sonora, Mexico, and finally to negotiate a peaceful surrender.

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Open to the public.

11/28/2023

Join us this week for 2 screenings presented by the Finnastic!
See below for further information.
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"Finntastic!: New Films from Finland is made possible by the Finnish Film Foundation, Jaana Puskala, Jenni Domingo, Otto Suuronen and Arttu Manninen."

Hatching
(Finland, 2022, 88 min.)
Directed by Hanna Bergholm
Thursday, November 30, 7:00 PM
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

In HATCHING, 12-year-old gymnast, Tinja (Siiri Solalinna), is desperate to please her obsessed mother, whose popular blog ‘Lovely Everyday Life’ presents their family’s idyllic existence as manicured suburban perfection. One day, after finding a wounded bird in the woods, Tinja brings its strange egg home, nestles it in her bed, and nurtures it until it hatches. The creature that emerges becomes her closest friend and a living nightmare, plunging Tinja beneath the impeccable veneer into a twisted reality that her mother refuses to see. HATCHING is a fascinating portrait of the nature of maternal instinct, as Tinja battles to come to terms with the genuine emotional bond with her grotesque and bloodthirsty newfound family while contending with the fraying connection to her own demanding mother.

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Open to the public.

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Aalto
Directed by Virpi Suutari
(Finland, 2020, 102 min.)
Friday, December 1, 7:00 PM
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Virpi Suutari is an awarded film maker known for her personal cinematic style and emotional narratives. Her films have been shown all over the world.The The Idle Ones (2002) was nominated for the Best European Documentary (EFA) and she has got several awards as the Best Nordic Documentary. Her latest film, Entrepreneur, was in the Masters selection at IDFA 2018. Virpi has received the national Jussi Award (the Finnish Oscars) three times. She is working with the top film professionals, among them editor Jussi Rautaniemi, who has edited internationally acclaimed films such as The happiest day in the life of Olli Mäki (Un certain regard -prize Cannes 2016)

AALTO is an enchanting documentary film journey into the life and work of one of the greatest modern architects Alvar Aalto. The film shares for the first time the intimate love story of Alvar and his architect wife Aino Aalto. It takes the viewer on a cinematic tour to their creative processes and iconic buildings all over the world. We visit their buildings in Finland, a library in Russia, a student dormitory at MIT, an art collector´s private house near Paris, a pavilion in Venice – and many other unique places.

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Free and open to the public.

11/16/2023

Join us this week for 2 screenings presented by the Houston Cinema Arts Festival!
See below for further information.

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Filmmaker Masterclass with Lucy Kerr
Saturday November 18, 4:00pm
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Join Lucy Kerr for a masterclass.

Lucy Kerr (b. Houston, Texas 1990) is a filmmaker, artist, choreographer, and educator. Her work is rooted in questions of image-making and performance and how both of these are tied up with ritual and transformation. Kerr received and MFA in Film/Video and Art from California Institute of the Arts in 2020. In 2022, she was named one of the 25 New Faces of Independent Film in Filmmaker Magazine. Her debut feature film, Family Portrait, premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in 2023 and garnered her the Locarno Boccalino d’Oro for Best Director, the feature film grant from Austin Film Society and the AirFrance Prize from FIDLab, and the New Horizons Award from US in Progress at the American Film Festival in Wroclaw, Poland. Her short film, Crashing Waves, is in the permanent collection of Frac Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in Marseille, France. Kerr’s projects have been presented by International Film Festival Rotterdam, FIDMarseille, San Sebastian International Film Festival, Reykjavik International Film Festival, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, REDCAT, Anthology Film Archives, Francois Ghebaly Gallery, The McEvoy Foundation for the Arts, and others.

General admission tickets can be purchased here: https://www.cinemahtx.org/hcaf/
Free for Rice students, for tickets email: [email protected]

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

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Eiffel Towers and Hoover Dams: New Experimental Films
Sunday, November 19, 1:00 pm
Sewall Hall, room 301
& room 258 (Sleepy Cyborg Gallery)

This block of new experimental short films is programmed by HCAF partner, Michael Sicinski. Michael Sicinski is a writer and critic who specializes in the analysis of experimental cinema. He is a frequent contributor to Cinema Scope, Cineaste, and Cargo. He also teaches film studies in the Art History Department at the University of Houston.

Tomonari Nishikawa, Light, Noise, Smoke, and Light, Noise, Smoke (Japan, 2023, 6 min)

Ayanna Dozier, Vincent Gallo’s S***m (U.S., 2022, 3 min)

Anna Kipervaser, Бабушка Галя и Дедушка Аркадий / Grandma Galya & Grandpa Arkadiy (U.S. / Ukraine, 2023, 5 min)

Erica Sheu, It follows It passes on (U.S. / Taiwan, 2023, 6 min)

Adam Piron, Yaangna Plays Itself (Kiowa Tribe / U.S., 2022, 8 min)

TT Takemoto, Lion in the Wind (U.S., 2023, 5 min)

Sara Sowell, Color Negative (U.S., 2023, 6 min)

Shambhavi Kaul, Slow Shift (India / U.S., 2023, 9 min)

Blake Williams, Laberint Sequences (Canada, 2023, 21 min)

Ken Jacobs, Eternalisms (U.S., 2023, 20 min loop – *Sewall Hall, room 258/ Sleepy Cyborg Gallery, lower level)

A selection of brief works made with Jacobs’ Eternalism method, a 3D effect with parallax and color shift, each running approximately 30 seconds. Be advised: these works use a gentle strobing effect.

General admission tickets can be purchased here: https://www.cinemahtx.org/hcaf/

Free for Rice students, for tickets email: [email protected]

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Open to the public.

11/09/2023

Join us this week for 2 screenings presented by the Houston Cinema Arts Festival!
See below for further information.

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A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love
(Germany, 2022, 104 min.)

Directed by Nicolette Krebitz
Saturday November 11, 12:30 pm
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Co-sponsored by Houston Cinema Arts Society.

Following her controversial and unsettlingly seductive WILD, director-writer Nicolette Krebitz returns with an equally, if not more subversive take on love and the human desire for connection. A playful look at romance and the curious bonds of the heart, the film jumps off at a chance encounter between an aging actress (German cinema mainstay Sophie Rois) and a young mugger (newcomer Milan Herns) and follows the pair as they fall in love in what is surely one of the most thoroughly unexpected romantic comedies in recent memory. Co-starring the legendary cult star Udo Kier (BLOOD FOR DRACULA, SWAN SONG).

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

General admission tickets can be purchased here: https://www.cinemahtx.org/hcaf/

Free for Rice students, for tickets email: [email protected]

Open to the public.

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From Short to Feature: Katherine Propper Masterclass
(United States, 2023, 120 min.)

Saturday November 11, 4:00 pm
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Join Katherine Propper for a masterclass.

Katherine Propper is a writer-director born and raised in Los Angeles and currently based in Austin. Her feature directorial debut, LOST SOULZ premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival 2023. Her 2022 short film BIRDS won the Grand Jury Prize at AFI Fest, a Special Jury Award for Vision at SXSW, and a Special Jury Prize in the International Competition at Clermont-Ferrand in France. Her 2019 short film STREET FLAME screened at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Katherine received her MFA in Film Directing from the University of Texas at Austin and a BA in Art History from Georgetown University.

General admission tickets can be purchased here: https://www.cinemahtx.org/hcaf/
Free for Rice students, for tickets email: [email protected]

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

11/02/2023

Join us this week for 2 screenings co-sponsored by the American Council and the Moroccan Earthquake Relief!
See below for further information.
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The Courtroom
(US, 87 min)
Saturday, November 3, 7:00 pm
Directed by: Lee Sunday Evans
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Please join a special screening of Waterwell’s film, “The Courtroom” and an informative panel discussion hosted by The American Immigration Council. �

Moderator: Charles C. Foster Chairman, Foster LLP Globally recognized leading U.S. Immigration Attorney

Panelists: Jacob Monty Managing Partner, Monty & Ramirez LLP

Steve Stephens CEO, Amegy Bank and Chair, GHP Immigration Working Group ��

This event will gather Houston’s most influential minds, including: members and alumni of the American Leadership Forum, Leadership Houston, Center for Houston’s Future, key media, and industry thought leaders.

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Registration is encouraged, free and open to the public. Please click the link below!
https://events.rice.edu/event/354493-the-courtroom

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Collapsed Walls
Directed by Hakim Belabbes
(Morocco, 2022, 136 min.)
Saturday, November 4, 7:00 pm
Rice Cinema, Sewall Hall 301

Introduced by Hakim Belabbes and Moderated by Abdellatif Adnane

The event is sponsored by the Moroccan Eartquake Relief.

The residents of a small Moroccan city endure separate lives while knowing the same cycles of burden and small joys. Wives and husbands, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters maneuver their way through mourning as death takes loved ones and life insists on moving forward. Here, letting go is a challenge for both the dead and the living. The people of this city share the same world but don’t always know when they live in each other’s lives, helping and harming each other. Connected by friendship, proximity, and blood, they both destroy and support each other. Through weddings, funerals, murders, forgiveness, love, new birth, and sacrifice, the living builds community and hope. Meanwhile, the souls of the dead linger to watch over loved ones.

Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

10/18/2023

Join us this week for 2 screenings co-sponsored by Multicultural Community Relations in the Office of Public Relations as part of Hispanic Heritage Celebration Month! All of the events are FREE this week!
See below for further information.

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Kill Me Please (Mate-Me Por Favor)
(Brazil, 2015, 101 min.)
Directed by Anita Rocha da Silveira
Friday October 20, 7:00 pm

From Brazil, we are showing Please Kill Me, a teen thriller that won best director for Anita Rocha da Silveira, in her directorial debut, at the Rio de Janeiro film festival. “Bodies in liminal states — between life and death, adult and child — exist in a state of psychic mayhem. For these young women, their curiosity about s*x is inextricably entwined with their learning about the dangers of the world. “Kill Me Please” acknowledges the dark and riotous physical energy of teen girls in this tribute to slasher films and coming-of-age comedies that proves to be a new classic from first frame to last” – Katie Walsh, Los Angeles Times.

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The First Year
Directed by Patricio Guzmán
(France, 2023, 96 min.)
Saturday, October 21
Reception in Welcome Center Foyer at 6:00 PM
Film screening at 7:00 PM

For the final film in this series, we return to Patricio Guzmán, the Chilean director of The Battle of Chile and Nostalgia for the Light. The film is shot in 1972 following the election of Salvador Allende and before the coup that brought him down. It tells the story of citizens and workers who are freed for a moment in time from the depravations of their life. “A dual ode to the revolutionary potential of Latin America beyond Cuba and a celebration of decades of organizing in Chile. This is an active cinema for an active audience.” —Rosa Martinez, Pop Matters. “Guzmán’s documentary is a people’s microhistory of a nation in transition. He talks to Indigenous peasants about Allende’s land-redistribution programs, miners and factory workers about the nationalization of resources that were being exploited by American business, fishermen about policies designed to liberate them from predatory middlemen. Guzmán’s camera is dynamic, probing faces and gazes with curiosity, and his interviewees are forthright. The film throbs with jubilant energy” – Devika Girish, New York Times.

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Discounted parking available at Founder’s Court, $6 flat rate, credit card required.

Free and open to the public.

Address

Sewall Hall Room 301
Houston, TX
77005

Telephone

+1 713-348-4853

Website

http://cinema.rice.edu/

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