The Contenders, an end-of-the-year program of screenings that offers filmgoers the opportunity to see a wide spectrum of films made in the last 12 months that are contenders for the upcoming awards season, “cult classic” status, and/or lasting historical significance, as determined by curators in the Museum’s Department of Film.

ContemporAsian, The Museum of Modern Art’s monthly series spotlighting contemporary films by emerging directors throughout Asia, continues this fall with new films from the Philippines, Pakistan, and India. Digital filmmaking and international coproductions are rapidly transforming an industry in which the transnational flow of talent and resources—even between the U.S. and Asia—has become the norm.

Modern Mondays, The Museum of Modern Art’s Monday night screening series of new works by contemporary filmmakers and multimedia artists, continues this fall with engaging and thought-provoking programming by a diverse selection of cutting-edge international artists.

The Museum of Modern Art presents To Save and Project: The Sixth MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation, its annual festival of preserved and restored films from international film archives and studios around the world, from October 24 through November 16, 2008.

November 2008, the Whitechapel’s Laboratory programme in partnership with museums in China, Europe, Latin America and North America brings together emerging international film and video artists.

A weekend of Charlie Chaplin films has been announced for Belfast’s Waterfront Hall in December.

The Walker Art Center presents Cinema of Urgency, which focuses a documentary lens on some of the world’s most pressing concerns, showing the need for a global perspective on issues that affect us all, such as civil liberties, drinking water, government secrecy, and how the world sees us as Americans.

Hooked on the Shadow: A Solar Eclipse Documentary (2000, 28 min.), by David Makepeace, is a startling documentary that examines the transformative experience of witnessing a total solar eclipse. View this film at the Exploratorium on July 31, 2008, as part of the Exploratorium's all-night eclipse viewing event.

The Museum of Modern Art presents Premiere Brazil!, its sixth annual exhibition of contemporary Brazilian cinema, July 17 through 31, 2008. A collaboration between MoMA and the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival, this series introduces New York audiences to original films by both new and established Brazilian filmmakers.

The Museum of Modern Art celebrates two decades of films distributed by New York–based Zeitgeist Films with the 20-title exhibition Zeitgeist: The Films of Our Time, June 26–July 23, 2008, in the Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters. Offering a fascinating snapshot of independent American and international film from the past 20 years, Zeitgeist: The Films of Our Time is a selection of works by critical figures in the company's history and catalog.

The Museum of Modern Art presents Dali: Painting and Film, the first exhibition to focus on the profound relationship between the paintings and films of Salvador Dali (Spanish, 1904–1989). The exhibition proposes that Dali's personal engagement with cinema—as a filmgoer, a screenwriter, a filmmaker, and an art director—was fundamental to his understanding of modernism and deeply affected his art.

Seattle Symphony and Seattle International Film Festival come together to bring audiences the epic tale of the legendary Russian hero Alexander Nevsky. Chinese-American conductor Xian Zhang will lead the Orchestra in Sergey Prokofiev's sweeping score as the film is shown on a large screen above the stage.