19 Years of the Burns: New Releases Watchlist

by JBFC Marketing Associate Paige Grand Pré

In celebration of the JBFC’s 19th birthday on Sunday, June 21, we’ve put together a few curated watchlists that encapsulate the quintessential JBFC experience so you can party virtually with us from home. Get started with this sampling of new release films we’ve screened, discussed, and enjoyed over the past 19 years! If you’re a Letterboxd user, you can also check out the list on the JBFC’s Letterboxd account to save for later.

1. Brokeback Mountain (Lee, 2005) – Opened as a new release in 2005, and screened as part of Adapted: Page to Screen in 2019.
2. Whale Rider (Caro, 2005) – Originally opened as a new release, and is now a mainstay of the JBFC Education Film Library.
3. Persepolis (Paronnaud/Satrapi, 2007) – Opened as a new release in 2007 before going on to become a mainstay of the JBFC Education Film Library; the film returned in 2017 for a week of screenings in support of The Seventh Art Stand, an ongoing act of cinematic solidarity against Islamophobia and the Muslim Ban.
4. Slumdog Millionaire (Boyle, 2008) – Opened as a new release; filmmaker Danny Boyle and actor Dev Patel subsequently joined us for a JBFC Live Q&A.
5. Dogtooth (Lanthimos, 2009) – Opened as a new release before winning the Foreign Language Film Oscar. We’ve gone on to open multiple films by Lanthimos since, including The Lobster and The Favourite.
6. Meek’s Cutoff (Reichardt, 2010) – Initially screened as part of Catching Up in 2011. In 2017, filmmaker Kelly Reichardt joined Jonathan Demme at the JBFC for a Saddle Up Saturdays screening that, unbeknownst to us at the time, would ultimately become Demme’s last Q&A at the JBFC.
7. Beasts of the Southern Wild (Zeitlin, 2012) – Opened as a new release; filmmaker  and Westchester native Ben Zeitlin has participated in multiple JBFC Educational programs.
8. Manchester by the Sea (Lonergan, 2016) – One of our most successful new releases of all time!
9. Embrace of the Serpent (Guerra, 2015) – Opened as a new release before going on to screen as part of Programmers’ Picks the following year.
10. Parasite (Bong, 2019) – Our most successful new release of 2019 comes from director Bong Joon-ho, who was an International Artist-in-Residence at the JBFC back in 2015, during which time he worked on pre-production for Okja.

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