Like many of the fall film festivals, New York Film Festival had to mount its 2023 edition during the actors strike and without major stars like Emma Stone ("Poor Things"), Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore ("May December") or Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal ("All of Us Strangers") in attendance to promote their movies.

After last year’s industrywide strikes rendered cinema-going a bit less exciting, film festivals have been returning in full force the past few months, renewing excitement around filmmaking at large.

Baseball, murder, the politics of art, and the art of teaching are on display in the city’s prime showcase for ambitious movies.

Standout selections include “Nickel Boys,” the Mumbai-set “All We Imagine as Light” and the documentary “Dahomey,” about African repatriation.

Sixty years ago, the organizers of the first New York Film Festival held their breath as what was then seen as a bold experiment began. Then, just as it is now, the location was Lincoln Center. The world of film and our city has changed a lot since 1963,

The movie year tends to come into focus at the New York Film Festival, which prizes itself on being a curated gathering of the best cinema from around the world.