The New Zealand Federation of Film Societies will host more than 400 niche film screenings in 15 societies across the North and South Islands in 2012, starting in March.

The addition of three new societies in Riverton, Tekapo and Pukekohe brings the total expected audience to 20,000 for the volunteer-run Film Societies.

“At a time when arthouse cinemas are closing and festivals are increasingly restricting themselves to the main centres, our federation is expanding with new societies in rural areas that have no other access to art cinema,” says Federation President Ryan Reynolds.

“And most festivals and cinemas have an almost exclusive focus on new films, whereas film societies regularly screen old classics, rarities, forgotten films and directors’ retrospectives.”

In 2011, New Zealand became a member of the 48-nation International Federation of Film Societies (IFFS), which has enabled this year’s presentation of four Latin American documentaries. The films have never before screened outside of South America, including a film about Chilean poet Pablo Neruda and the ‘poetry of architecture’.

At a local level the societies provide weekly screenings to members throughout the year, newsletters, blogs, Facebook pages, social events and guest speakers.

“We’re fostering a culture of film appreciation and analysis by providing a year-round curated programme of films generally not available via other distribution channels. It encourages the same group of people to meet regularly throughout the year and form a sense of community,” says Reynolds.

The 2012 national programme of touring films will include three classic films noir: The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and Mildred Pierce (1945), the latter of which has been remde into an Emmy-award winning miniseries starring Kate Winslet.

New Zealand films will feature with Armagan Ballantyne’s The Strength of Water (2009), Florian Habicht’s Woodenhead (2003), Geoff Murphy’s Blerta Revisited (2001) and Paul Wolffram’s Stori Tumbuna: Ancestors’ Tales. The Artists Cinema short film programme is curated and presented by Mark Williams with commissioned shorts by visual artists Alex Monteith, Sean Grattan, Phil Dadson, Gray Nicol, Sriwhana Spong and Ronnie van Hout.

Two vintage Australian outback films will screen as 35mm presentations where possible: Wake in Fright (1971), which after a brief release was unavailable in any format until its 2009 restoration, and Walkabout (1971) directed by Nicholas Roeg.

A rare opportunity to see Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s science-fiction epic World on a Wire has been made possible with the assistance of the Goethe-Institut.

Two silent films are programmed for around the country: Danish Asta Nielsen’s Hamlet (1921) and FW Murnau’s final film, Tabu (1931), a collaboration with Robert Flaherty (Nanook of the North). Both films have soundtracks, but several societies will present them with live accompaniment.

We celebrate the recent renaissance of Italian film with Paolo Sorrentino's The Consequences of Love (2004) and Matteo Garrone's Gomorrah (2008), screening alongside classics from the past – Vittorio de Sica's masterpiece, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970) and the film that made Fellini a household name: La Strada (1954).

Contemporary world cinema titles such as 24 Hour Party People (Winterbottom, 2001), Ae Fond Kiss (Loach, 2004), Coffee & Cigarettes (Jarmusch, 2003), The Cat’s Meow (Bogdanovich, 2001), Paradise Now (Hany Abu-Assad, 2004), Red Like the Sky (Cristiano Bortano, 2006) and Ashes of Time Redux (Wong Kar-wai, 1994/2008) will also screen around the country.

The 2012 NZ Federation of Film Societies’ curated programme comprises 54 films from 18 countries spanning the years 1921 to 2011. The NZFFS is a registered charity.

Find more about the films and your local film society, dates and screening times at: http://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/