For half a century, Rice Cinema has maintained an international reputation as an important cultural center in Houston, Texas. As defined by its founders, Jean and Dominique de Menil, it is a cinemateque experience for both the screening of great films and the opportunity to discuss these works. This program emerges from the spirit of artists and teachers like James Blue, Roberto Rossellini, and Colin Young who saw cinema as a subject of conversation and part of a community, rather than a commodity to be consumed.

Rice Cinema regularly shows documentaries, foreign films, and experimental cinema and has brought filmmakers from all parts of the world to present their work. Among the many filmmakers that have come through our doors are Andy Warhol, Jean Luc Godard, Dennis Hopper, Richard Lester, Sam Peckinpah, Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Fernando Solanas, Shirin Neshat, Patricio Guzman, Arturo Ripstein, Albert Maysles, and many others.

Rice Cinema has the ability to screen almost any film ever made, from early silent cinema to contemporary world digital cinema, including 16mm and 35mm film formats. As part of the filmmaking program in the Department of Art it brings the communities of Rice and the city of Houston together over the most significant form of storytelling in the modern world.