CIFF On The Hand May Be Quite Continental
The Chicago International Film Festival returns to mostly in-person screenings, though with a weaker lineup than normal. I might have seen three more movies if I didn't have a quick trip to GameHoleCon in Madison blotting out the Thursday and Friday screenings, and I'm putting off Corsage (Marie Kreutzer), Banshees of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh), The Whale (Darren Aronofsky), White Noise (Noah Baumbach), and Decision to Leave (Park Chan-wook) until they open wide (and Glass Onion (Rian Johnson) when it drops on Netflix), but even as it is I have one more ticket unused in my pass. But with such cavils and caveats aside, here's my CIFF plan as it stands:
SATURDAY OCT 15
5:00 Louis Armstrong's Black & Blues (Sacha Jenkins, US) Documentary featuring new footage and recordings. [Playing at the Siskel Center]
8:00 The Beasts (Rodrigo Sorogoyen, Spain/France) Looks like Straw Dogs in rural Spain, so promises much grip.
SUNDAY OCT 16
12:30 The Year Between (Alex Heller, US) Chicago-set coming-of-age comedy by a first-time director-writer-actor, worth a gamble.
8:00 How to Blow Up A Pipeline (Daniel Goldhaber, US) I will be very interested to see which thriller tropes this eco-thriller unthinkingly adopts.
(Sheila and I are seeing Amsterdam (David O. Russell) in between these two screenings.)
MONDAY OCT 17
1:00 A Wounded Faun (Travis Stevens, US) An art-world murder-myth of the Furies, now with giallo!
WEDNESDAY OCT 19
6:00 King of Kings: Chasing Edward Jones (Harriet Marin Jones, France/US) Documentary about the South Side's numbers racket king in the 1930s. [Showing at the Chicago Historical Society]
SATURDAY OCT 22
8:00 Pacifiction (Albert Serra, France/Spain/Germany/Portugal) "De Roller, France’s top man in post-colonial Tahiti, grows paranoid as rumors of military tests begin circulating throughout the island in this mesmerizing, elliptical vision of declining colonial enterprise and imperialist corruption."
10:30 Leonor Will Never Die (Martika Ramirez Escobar, Philippines) "When an aging action screenwriter is knocked into a coma by a falling television, she becomes trapped in one of her unfinished scripts and must find a way to complete the story while still unconscious."
SUNDAY OCT 23
4:45 The Passengers of the Night (Mikhaël Hers, France) Charlotte Gainsbourg plays a call-in radio producer in 80s Paris and that seems like a great way to end a CIFF.
For the insatiably curious, I also have virtual tickets for Vicenta B, Rounding, and the Horror Shorts. Come out to see (the rest of) them with us!
SATURDAY OCT 15
5:00 Louis Armstrong's Black & Blues (Sacha Jenkins, US) Documentary featuring new footage and recordings. [Playing at the Siskel Center]
8:00 The Beasts (Rodrigo Sorogoyen, Spain/France) Looks like Straw Dogs in rural Spain, so promises much grip.
SUNDAY OCT 16
12:30 The Year Between (Alex Heller, US) Chicago-set coming-of-age comedy by a first-time director-writer-actor, worth a gamble.
8:00 How to Blow Up A Pipeline (Daniel Goldhaber, US) I will be very interested to see which thriller tropes this eco-thriller unthinkingly adopts.
(Sheila and I are seeing Amsterdam (David O. Russell) in between these two screenings.)
MONDAY OCT 17
1:00 A Wounded Faun (Travis Stevens, US) An art-world murder-myth of the Furies, now with giallo!
WEDNESDAY OCT 19
6:00 King of Kings: Chasing Edward Jones (Harriet Marin Jones, France/US) Documentary about the South Side's numbers racket king in the 1930s. [Showing at the Chicago Historical Society]
SATURDAY OCT 22
8:00 Pacifiction (Albert Serra, France/Spain/Germany/Portugal) "De Roller, France’s top man in post-colonial Tahiti, grows paranoid as rumors of military tests begin circulating throughout the island in this mesmerizing, elliptical vision of declining colonial enterprise and imperialist corruption."
10:30 Leonor Will Never Die (Martika Ramirez Escobar, Philippines) "When an aging action screenwriter is knocked into a coma by a falling television, she becomes trapped in one of her unfinished scripts and must find a way to complete the story while still unconscious."
SUNDAY OCT 23
4:45 The Passengers of the Night (Mikhaël Hers, France) Charlotte Gainsbourg plays a call-in radio producer in 80s Paris and that seems like a great way to end a CIFF.
For the insatiably curious, I also have virtual tickets for Vicenta B, Rounding, and the Horror Shorts. Come out to see (the rest of) them with us!