"Rialto Pictures has enriched American film culture by both reviving a significant number of classic films not seen in theaters since their original runs and premiering extraordinary films never before distributed in America."
– The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Described as “the gold standard of reissue distributors” by Los Angeles Times/NPR film critic Kenneth Turan,
Rialto Pictures was founded in 1997 by Bruce Goldstein. A year later, Adrienne Halpern joined him as partner. In 2002, Eric Di Bernardo became the company’s National Sales Director.

Rialto’s past releases have included Renoir’s Grand Illusion; Carol Reed’s The Third Man; Fellini’s Nights of Cabiria; Jules Dassin’s Rififi; De Sica’s Umberto D; Godard’s Contempt, Band of Outsiders, Masculine Feminine and A Woman is a Woman; Julien Duvivier’s Pépé le Moko; Buñuel’s Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Diary of a Chambermaid, The Phantom of Liberty, The Milky Way and That Obscure Object of Desire; John Schlesinger’s Billy Liar; Clouzot’s Quai des Orfèvres; Mike Nichols’ The Graduate; The Maysles’ Grey Gardens; Mel Brooks’ The Producers; Jacques Becker’s Touchez Pas Au Grisbi; Bresson’s Au Hasard Balthazar; Franju’s Eyes Without A Face; and Jean-Pierre Melville’s Bob le Flambeur and Le Cercle Rouge, the latter released for the first time in its uncut European version.
 
In 2002, the company released the critically-acclaimed first-run film Murderous Maids, the chilling true story of two homicidal sisters, starring Sylvie Testud.

Rialto celebrated a record-breaking 2004 with the previously unreleased, original 1954 Japanese version of Ishiro Honda’s Godzilla; and Gillo Pontecorvo’s groundbreaking The Battle of Algiers, which became one of the year’s top-grossing foreign films.

In 2006, Rialto released Melville’s 1969 epic masterpiece Army of Shadows for the very first time in the United States. Army of Shadows became the most critically acclaimed film of last year, topping many Ten Best lists, including those in The New York Times and Premiere, and was named Best Foreign Film of 2006 by the New York Film Critics Circle, in addition to receiving special awards from both the Los Angeles and National Society of Film Critics.

Rialto’s re-release of Alberto Lattuada’s Mafioso, a dark comedy from 1962 starring Alberto Sordi, was the unqualified highlight of the 2006 New York Film Festival.  2007 re-releases included Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Doulos, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo, and Jean-Jacques Beineix's "second wave" thriller Diva. 
 
In 2008, the company had phenomenal success with Alain Resnais's 1962 arthouse classic Last Year at Marienbad. Rialto has also released Robert Hamer's rediscovered masterwork of " Brit Noir," It Always Rains on Sunday, and undertook their second hugely successful reissue of Godard's Contempt. Another successful re-release was Max Ophüls' legendary film Lola Montès in a definitive new 35mm restoration, which was showcased to enormous acclaim at the Cannes and Telluride Film Festivals and was the spotlight retrospective of the 2008 New York Film Festival.