:: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 23 - THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 29 ::

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🌈 REELING: THE CHICAGO LGBTQ+ INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

The 40th edition of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival continues through Thursday, October 6. This week’s in-person screenings take place at Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema (2828 N. Clark St.), for which we have select reviews below. The virtual component of the festival will be hosted on the Eventive streaming platform starting Friday, September 30th at and will be available until October 6. More info on the festival here.

International Shorts
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Saturday, 12:30pm
Curated by Cine-File Managing Editor emeritus Patrick Friel, this program spans three continents and a variety of aesthetic approaches in just five short films. The Swedish entry BEAR (2022, 15 min) is the most lighthearted of these. It’s a comic narrative about a shy man in his 20s who turns to a childhood teddy bear for romantic and sexual companionship when he finds he’s too timid to enter the dating scene. Director Jimi Vall Peterson establishes a sweet, ingratiating tone, making it clear that we’re watching a sort-of fable and not a realistic story about arrested development. Shooting on black-and-white celluloid and favoring plainspoken static shots, Peterson invokes the deadpan comedy of early Jim Jarmusch films. Also concerned with an introverted man’s fantasy life is Dania Bdeir’s WARSHA (2022, 15 min), which mostly takes place in the cab of a construction-site crane. The hero, a Syrian immigrant working in Beirut, imagines himself performing in drag while he sits up in the sky. Bdeir creates sharp contrasts between images of confinement and liberation, resulting in an affecting, largely dialogue-free cinematic poem. The Peruvian selection THE DISTANCE OF TIME (2021, 19 min) is another work in a poetic register; it’s even less concerned with narrative progression than WARSHA. Writer-director Carlos Ormeño Palma looks at an androgynous Indigenous man caring for his male lover, who suffers from an unspecified fatal disease. The film develops its premise mostly obliquely; the emphasis is on landscapes and emotional states. One feels the protagonist’s condition without necessarily understanding his whole story, which is fine, given the beauty of the images. Rounding out the program are two works by Brazilian filmmaker Caio Scot, BURN (2022, 23 min) and ALL THE AWARDS I NEVER GAVE YOU (2022, 17 min), both of which concern the fall-out of romantic relationships after they’ve ended. In BURN, a man returns with his boyfriend to the home where he grew up before it’s demolished. On the trip, the two men encounter the hero’s childhood neighbor, with whom he was once sexually involved. There’s a pleasant loping quality to the storytelling that spotlights the main character’s conflicted feelings about his past; his experience of reckoning is more important than whether he resolves anything. ALL THE AWARDS I NEVER GAVE YOU concerns the reunion of two filmmakers who used to be lovers backstage at an awards ceremony. Emotionally vibrant where BURN is muted, the film presents the messy side of nostalgia, as the two characters experience a range of emotions during the brief running time. [Ben Sachs]
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Juliana Curi’s UÝRA - THE RISING FOREST (Brazil/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Saturday, 1pm
Pioneering species recognize each other. This is a title card from UÝRA: THE RISING FOREST, an intriguing look at indigenous trans people from Brazil’s Amazon rainforest as they attempt to reclaim their culture and fight for the environment that the documentary graphically demonstrates is being despoiled by a horrifyingly greedy and careless Western ethos. At the center of the film is Uýra, who works with other trans indigenous adults and indigenous youth to rediscover their connection to the land and each other as a form of resistance. At one point, what these people do is called drag, but it is a most exquisitely organic and purposeful drag in which the performers transform themselves into plants and native animals to allow the forest to speak through them to others who have a stake in Brazil’s future. What dialogue there is comes mainly from Uýra, whose simple and profound words left me quite breathless with admiration. (2022, 72 min, DCP Digital) [Marilyn Ferdinand]
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Nicholas Eliopoulos’ CELEBRATING LAUGHTER: THE LIFE AND FILMS OF COLIN HIGGINS (US/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Saturday, 2:30pm
Though it leaves something to be desired as a film, CELEBRATING LAUGHTER: THE LIFE AND FILMS OF COLIN HIGGINS is a largely enjoyable and heartfelt overview of the writer-director’s life and career. Higgins had an interesting childhood: he was born in France to an American father and Australian mother, and he spent many of his formative years in Australia along with his four brothers. He came back to the U.S. for college (attending Stanford University in California), when he became obsessed with theater and started pursuing acting. He went to New York City for a bit, taking classes at the Actors Studio, but soon decided to enlist in the Army so as to secure a better assignment than he’d get if he was drafted. Higgins eventually made his way back to Stanford, where he graduated with a degree in creative writing; he still dabbled in acting, performing in plays at his university and the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Inspired by the film exhibitions at the 1967 International and Universal Exposition in Montreal, Higgins became interested in filmmaking. It was at UCLA while he was pursuing a MFA in screenwriting that he made a short film as his thesis project that would later become HAROLD AND MAUDE (1971); the feature-length version of the film came to fruition after Higgins divulged his idea to the young daughter of a famous Hollywood producer for whom he was working as a chauffeur. From here, director Nicholas Eliopoulos tracks his auspicious career as a screenwriter on such films as HAROLD, the 1973 TV movie THE DEVIL’S DAUGHTER, and Arthur Hiller’s SILVER STREAK (1976), starring Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor. Each film is given approximately equal weight in terms of information and anecdotes provided via an array of talking heads (which may be one reason why it feels overlong), but it’s compelling nonetheless. HAROLD elicits the most poignant insights throughout, as it was the reason why many of the stars Higgins later worked with were eager to collaborate with him. Then came his directorial efforts, starting with FOUL PLAY (1978), starring Goldie Hawn and Chevy Chase, leading to 9 TO 5 (1980) and THE BEST LITTLE WHOREHOUSE IN TEXAS (1982), both starring the inimitable Dolly Parton. Eliopoulos, a longtime friend of his subject, anchors this rather amateurish documentary in the star power of Parton and her co-stars Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda from 9 TO 5, who appear in brief talking-head interviews saying nothing but nice things about Higgins and each other. One gets the sense that, in addition to being a great talent, Higgins was also a great person, who brought out the best in those with whom he worked. It’s revealed toward the end that Higgins was gay, eventually dying of AIDS. This part is heartbreaking; in archival footage from a memorial shortly after his death, Hawn and Shirley MacLaine, whose book Out on a Limb Higgins adapted for TV, give moving tributes that brought me to tears. If not a groundbreaking film, it’s nevertheless a penetrating conspectus. (2022, 107 min, DCP Digital) [Kat Sachs]
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Hannah Barlow and Kane Senes’ SISSY (Australia)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Saturday, 9:30 pm
SISSY falls in a recent trend of dark horror comedies about taking social media to the extreme—SPREE (2020) in particular comes to mind. Cecilia is a successful wellness influencer, living her life online and constantly repeating words of affirmation to her audience and herself. When she runs into her childhood best friend Emma (Hannah Barlow, who also co-directed the film), she’s at first hesitant to reconnect. But Emma’s about to get married and insists on Cecilia joining in on the celebrations. Emma and her partner Fran (Lucy Barrett) invite Cecilia to their bachelorette weekend; however, the remote house is owned by Emma’s maid of honor, who also happens to be Cecilia’s former bully, Alex (Emily De Margheriti)—and she can’t help but refer to Cecilia by a cruel nickname, “Sissy.” As Cecilia revisits her youth through these reconnections, she experiences bad memories and strange dreams. The past—and the present, as it turns out—may not be what it seems. There’s a dreaminess to SISSY; bright colors of the character’s clothes and accessories and disorienting camera angles and movements—often mimicking video footage or social media posts—diverge and blend to create a compellingly odd tone. The slow burn and constantly jarring music cues at times distract from the core story; as in SPREE, this makes it challenging to grasp the film’s interesting themes among the heightened reality it presents. Despite this tricky balance, SISSY becomes an unexpectedly unique take on the slasher film, supported by an excellent main performance by Aisha Dee as Cecilia. (2022, 102 min, DCP Digital) [Megan Fariello]
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Magnus Gertten’s NELLY & NADINE (Sweden/Belgium/Norway/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Sunday, 1pm 
The cynic in me often wonders if great love stories exist only in fiction. Then I see something like Swedish filmmaker Magnus Gertten’s NELLY & NADINE—his third documentary to include footage from the Malmö harbor where liberated female concentration camp prisoners had been taken in Sweden—and I’m reminded that my cynicism is easily disproved. Nelly, a Belgian opera singer, and Nadine, daughter of the Chinese ambassador to Spain, were both interred in the Ravensbrück concentration camp during World War II. Nelly, also known as Claire, was a heroic participant of the French resistance, and though it’s not confirmed, she later claimed that Nadine had been imprisoned for helping people escape into Spain by way of the Pyrenees. The two women had little in common besides their bravery when, on Christmas eve in the camp, Nadine requested that Nelly sing an aria from Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. “Her black hair, her ivory skin, her tilted eyes,” Nelly wrote in her diary that night. “Nadine.” As a voiceover narrator reads this passage, Nelly’s granddaughter sits in her kitchen looking at the original document. She appears surprised—not disproving, but shocked at this information among her grandmother’s ephemera  (which her mother, Nelly’s daughter, had kept hidden away during her lifetime). The granddaughter’s discovery of her grandmother’s relationship with Nadine, with whom Nelly later lived in Venezuela (the granddaughter and her sister visited them quite frequently), propels this beautifully crafted documentary about the women’s lifelong love affair after their first encounter in Ravensbrück. Gertten’s depiction of their relationship comprises many nuances, from revelations about the sexualities of Nelly, Nadine, and some of their friends to details about the society they all inhabited. The film is upraised by its ethereal cinematography and sober usage of archival materials. More than merely convey information about the womens’ life and love, the latter device also works on an emotional level to convey elements that couldn’t be succinctly put into words. (When words do come into play, the film relies on Nelly’s diary entries, which she and Nadine later worked to transform into a memoir that they had hoped to publish). I appreciate how the filmmaker connects Nelly’s granddaughter to literary historian Joan Schenkar, who provides information on Nadine’s past (she had been associated with a famous Paris literary salon led by and intended only for women, many of whom were lesbians); she also expands upon the circumstances in which Nelly and Nadine’s relationship flourished, or, in public spheres, didn’t. “Nothing is real, socially, until it’s expressed,” she says. Thankfully Gertten brings us in on her journey, allowing us to experience a genuine love story that was born in abject terror, fostered in plain-sight furtiveness, and now committed to posterity through cinema. (2022, 92 min, DCP Digital) [Kat Sachs]
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Bryan Darling and Jesse Finley Reed’s ALL MAN: THE INTERNATIONAL MALE STORY (US/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Sunday, 2:30pm
Fashion is so often a channel for exploring everyday fantasies and desires; it allows one to dress up in everyday life, exploring facets of identity, including gender and sexuality. ALL MAN: THE INTERNATIONAL MALE STORY examines this phenomenon through the history of the catalog/magazine. International Male, founded in the 1970s by former Air Force member Gene Burkard who built the company alongside eventual Vice President and Head Buyer, Gloria Tomita, was considered “Victoria’s Secret for men.” Bryan Darling and Jesse Finley Reed’s documentary does an excellent job of presenting the evolution of male fashion in the 20th century and its relationship to gay culture and the history of sex in America. It begins with Burkard’s own experiences in gay bars—including a raid at Chicago’s own Windup Lounge—and continues through gay and sexual liberation in the '70s and then the AIDS crisis, which resulted in devasting personal losses for the company and its clients. The documentary tracks the evolution of male fashion from the very uniform postwar style to the more varied colors and styles that showed up in the '60s, including in underwear; Burkard influenced this development with his invention of the Jock Sock and continued to emphasize underwear in the catalog. As one interviewee notes, straight and gay men “both fetishize masculinity,” and thus International Male presented not just specific clothing but a fantasy lifestyle for all—including women who wanted their male partners to dress a certain way. Interviewees in the documentary include Burkard himself (who passed away in 2020), International Male employees, models, and people whose identities were shaped and influenced by the catalog. Some of the more interesting conversations concern the models, who often struggled with the dichotomy between their traditionally masculine bodies and the feminine clothes they wore. The film also notes that the magazine featured very little diversity. In the end, the importance of the magazine is in its cultural effect on all representations of masculinity, and ALL MAN: THE INTERNATIONAL MALE STORY illuminates how fashion can be a site of disruption and change. (2022, 83 min, DCP Digital) [Megan Fariello]
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Debra Chasnoff and Kate Stilley Steiner’s PROGNOSIS: NOTES ON LIVING (US/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Sunday, 5pm
In 2015, documentary filmmaker Debra Chasnoff was diagnosed with stage 4 metastatic breast cancer. Chasnoff had been the target of rightwing vitriol for IT’S ELEMENTARY: TALKING ABOUT GAY ISSUES IN SCHOOL (1996), a film born from the worry she felt about how her two sons would be treated when their teachers and classmates learned they had two mothers. Now, she had a much different challenge on her hands. Like many crusading truthtellers, Chasnoff decided to chronicle her own fight against a powerful disease in hopes that it might help others in similar circumstances. Chasnoff and her wife, Nancy Otto, refused to hear the prognosis. They hoped they could continue to just live their lives and fit cancer into it. This optimistic attitude, however, collapsed pretty quickly once the initial stages of treatment gave way to the desperate struggle to survive. Chasnoff largely turned the camera over to others, including her frequent co-director Kate Stilley Steiner, to record everything from Chasnoff’s medical appointments and diagnostic tests to hiking, traveling, and meditation practice at a qi gong retreat. PROGNOSIS spares little in the way of Chasnoff’s emotional despair, and we see her hair loss (a shot of her chemo-eroded hair going down a drain is unexpectedly shocking), cognitive impairment, and physical enfeeblement. At the last, we sit with her as she dies at home, surrounded by loved ones, and view a close-up of her motionless, waxy face. As someone who saw her mother through her cancer illness and death, I can tell you that even these sobering moments don’t tell the whole story of the messiness of dying. Yet the lingering feeling left by PROGNOSIS is how fortunate Chasnoff was to have such loving relationships with her wife, grown sons, friends, and professional collaborators and how grateful she was that she had the financial and social supports she needed to really live while dying. Her film may help others understand the progression of a fatal illness, but it’s not likely to provide much comfort to anyone not as well-situated as she was. (2021, 79 min, DCP Digital) [Marilyn Ferdinand]
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Lyle Kash’s DEATH AND BOWLING (US)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Monday, 7:15 pm
When it comes to trans and queer representation in film, death and rebirth are consistent factors. Depictions of queer “rebirth” often come in the form of transition in one way or another, but our deaths are often not given the full range of emotional transformation. It’s tragic, it’s “gone too soon.” We are inundated with stories like these because they are real parts of our history, but death has always been a compelling and complicated vehicle for understanding ourselves. The dreamlike, tangled DEATH AND BOWLING understands these contradictions and refuses to shy away from them. When trans actor X (Will Krisanda) loses his queer maternal figure (the captain of his cherished lesbian bowling league), he struggles to find his sense of self. DEATH AND BOWLING is beautifully self-referential and acts as a metacritique, breaking down thoughts about transmasculinity and representation, both in life and in performance. Who am I when I am fixated on how I will be perceived in a film? Who am I when I instead allow myself to revel in community? The same person, sure, but it’s the burden of representation—not just being seen, but who sees him and why—that confounds this dynamic. But DEATH AND BOWLING is compelling outside of its questions of representation. By casting that idea aside through fractured storytelling, the film allows the rich emotions and relationships at the heart of this film to flourish. X is begging to have a happy ending, both in his work and in his life, but the true marker of his peace is cherishing his people so that he can move on from his grief and the intrusive questions in his own head. (2021, 64 min, DCP Digital) [Cody Corrall]
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Kamil Krawczycki’s ELEPHANT (Poland)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Monday, 9:15pm
In a secluded rural area of Poland, Bartek runs the family horse farm while caring for his depressed mother. At night he goes into town to bartend for the village’s mostly elderly populace. It’s a relatively mundane, uneventful existence until the arrival of musician Dawid, who’s returned home for the funeral of his estranged father. As some of the youngest people in the area, Bartek and Dawid hit it off, sharing stories of their respective broken families and their dreams of a better life in Iceland. Their friendship eventually blossoms into a romance that puts Bartek’s future on the farm into jeopardy. ELEPHANT was shot in one of Poland’s notorious “LGBT-free zones,” and while homophobia unavoidably plays a role in the film, it’s not the central conflict. Instead, the film hinges on a similarly familiar but no less poignant theme: the decision to stay at home or leave for greater freedom and possibilities elsewhere. ELEPHANT doesn’t make this choice easy for its protagonist; despite the parochial attitudes of his village, Bartek maintains strong connections to the land and is wary of repeating the actions of his father and sister by abandoning his mother. Krawczycki shoots the hilly landscape around the farm in rich autumnal shades, with his camera especially coming alive in the scenes of Bartek riding his cherished horse, wind in his hair. This calm reverence for nature gives ELEPHANT a placid, wistful tone, echoed in the tender chemistry between actors Jan Hrynkiewicz and Pawel Tomaszewski. The film may not have the heft of the titular pachyderm, but it does share its quiet gentleness and sturdy resolve. (2022, 105 min, DCP Digital) [Jonathan Leithold-Patt] 
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Amanda Kramer’s PLEASE BABY PLEASE (US)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Tuesday, 7 pm
Amanda Kramer’s PLEASE BABY PLEASE presents a surreally playful examination of power dynamics and gender roles; the extreme stylization of the film—an imagined version of 1950s New York—allows for characters to discuss and play out sexual fantasies in a fabricated, fictional space. Deep conversations about the roles of men and women and their relationships are surrounded by visual mischievousness: neon lighting, wipe edits, and theatrically staged sets create a sense of ease in its clear construction. PLEASE BABY PLEASE takes its themes seriously by presenting them in a setting out of time where they are completely unencumbered. While returning home to their apartment building, beatnik couple Arthur and Suze (Harry Melling and Andrea Riseborough) witness a vicious murder committed by a street gang, the Young Gents. Both are deeply affected; brooding Arthur is instantaneously attracted to the gang’s leader, Teddy (Karl Glusman), in his leather and mesh get-up complete with Brando-style cap, while Suze is concurrently troubled and titillated by the demonstration of masculine violence. Encouraged by an encounter with their femme fatale upstairs neighbor, Maureen (Demi Moore), Suze begins to explore her own S&M fantasies while Arthur struggles to come to terms with his masculinity. A WEST SIDE STORY-inspired musical number opens the film, and interludes continue throughout, marking shifts from scene to scene. PLEASE BABY PLEASE’s cast all commit to this earnest artifice, especially Riseborough as the catlike, curious Suze; a particular standout, as well, is comedian Cole Escola as Maureen’s friend, Billy. In its colorfully fun and mischievous vignettes, PLEASE BABY PLEASE is still a sincere scrutiny of strict cultural expectations and simultaneous celebration of the fluidity of gender and sexuality. (2022, 95 min, DCP Digital) [Megan Fariello]
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Broderick Fox’s MANSCAPING (US/Documentary)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Tuesday, 9:15 pm
If there is one place that is a hub for masculinity, it’s a barbershop. It’s a space for real men who know exactly what they want, down to the specific beard oil. But because of its reputation, the barbershop can often feel like an isolating or unwelcoming place for those who do not fit the very specific mold it's created. MANSCAPING shifts the lens of the barbershop to the queer men navigating and transforming the space around the world—and on their own terms. In Canada, a trans man’s barbershop is not only a safe space for everyone to get a haircut, but it’s also a communal resource for transition-related products like binders and packers. In Philadelphia, an artist uses their past experiences with barbers refusing to cut their hair along with queer stigma they’ve faced in the Black community to reimagine what an Afrofuturist inspired barbershop would look like. In Sydney, a fetish barber flips the expectation of a haircut and instead fosters an environment built on trust, vulnerability, and self-expression. With MANSCAPING, Broderick Fox acknowledges the narrowness of the traditional barbershop and challenges viewers to think more broadly of what masculinity means, who it serves, and who is left on the sidelines. Because, in the end, everyone just wants a good haircut. (2022, 62 min, DCP Digital) [Cody Corrall]
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Peter McDowell’s JIMMY IN SAIGON (US)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Wednesday, 7pm
Grief can be hard not only on the individual, but on the whole family. JIMMY IN SAIGON documents director Peter McDowell’s journey to recontextualize the death of his older brother Jimmy for himself, his brothers, sisters, and parents. The endeavor proves to be one that isn’t solvable in just one night: Peter was 5 years old in 1972 when his brother passed, and his documentary, years in the making, started production in 2010. The earliest footage is indicative of a filmmaker finding their footing, but there's some charm in watching McDowell’s capabilities evolve alongside his growing passion to answer the burning questions about Jimmy’s life. Jimmy lived in Vietnam following his service in the War, and despite a fair number of correspondences with family, some questions linger regarding not only his death, but also his lifestyle. In circumstances like these, even asking these questions can be painful, yet McDowell sees the potential for healing. Through archival footage, interviews, voice-overs, animation, and on-the-ground location footage, the film paints a portrait of a lovely young man whose life was tragically cut short. By the end, an understanding of Jimmy is found, yet it proves to be subjective to each individual or group that knew him. As a living work of art, JIMMY IN SAIGON will only add to that remarkable and ever-growing collage. (2022, 89 min, DCP Digital) [Drew Van Weelden]
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Scud’s BODYSHOP (Hong Kong)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Wednesday, 7:15 pm
Earlier this year, boundary-pushing Hong Kong filmmaker Scud announced his retirement. BODYSHOP is one of the last films he plans to put out, along with APOSTLES, an untitled trilogy about the early days of the pandemic, and NAKED NATION. Over his 16-year film career, Scud has ruffled feathers with his depictions of queer relationships, full-body nudity, and political commentary, so it’s fitting that one of his last films goes out with a bang. Put simply, BODYSHOP is a love letter to sex and connection in all its forms, buoyed by a sense of magical realism. The film follows the ghost of a young soldier as he makes his way through the world by possessing bodies in order to visit his sister. He uses his newfound power to mess with cheaters; in between body swaps, he often acts like a curious peeping tom, observing bodies while he himself is naked (as he is in death). The journey intensifies when he discovers the love of his life during the hectic Hong Kong protests and they take shelter together, pushing the film in an unabashedly political direction. The film disrupts its narrative with talking head interviews that help pull back the layers of the story, but in a way that never delegitimizes the fantasy. BODYSHOP is overrun with desire, both sexually and emotionally, as well as the complicated reality of what it means to truly say goodbye when you’re already gone. To watch a Scud film, BODYSHOP included, is to submit to his adoration of the body—how it looks, how it moves, how it yearns—and to envelop yourself in his intentional gaze. (2021, 89 min, DCP Digital) [Cody Corrall]
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Adam Kalderon’s THE SWIMMER (Israel)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Wednesday, 9pm
Governed by strict rules and formal procedures, organized sports don’t typically allow for the spontaneity of personal expression. Set in the world of competitive swimming, THE SWIMMER focuses on a young athlete whose desires are straitjacketed by a rigorous program and an imperious head coach. At the training camp where Erez has arrived—a camp that will determine who gets a spot on the Israeli Olympic team—athletes must follow a rigid set of protocols. Their coach, Dima, makes one thing emphatic in this decidedly solo sport: swimmers are forbidden from forming close bonds with one another. Such a dictate might be difficult for many, but it’s nothing short of stifling for Erez, who’s fallen for his competitor Nevo. In the showers, during workouts, and poolside, he must suppress his gay desire as his proximity to Nevo and the other scantily dressed men stirs feelings he’s unable to act on. It doesn’t help that Erez would rather be elsewhere, having been pressured into this situation by his parents, themselves former Olympic swimmers who met near the grounds of the facility where their son is training. Kalderon frames this detail as a sly metaphor for the heteronormative expectations parents often place on their children. He’s more blatant in his depiction of male socialization via the swimmers’ "locker room talk" and roughhousing. As in so many sports, machismo masks a latent homoeroticism, most memorably evoked in THE SWIMMER’s images of the men manually shaving their toned bodies. It may be an athletically prescribed action, but it also hints at the sensual potentials that transcend the rulebook. (2021, 84 min, DCP Digital) [Jonathan Leithold-Patt]
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Travis Fine’s TWO EYES (US)
Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema – Thursday, 7pm
TWO EYES is ambitious in its narrative form: it alternates between stories that take place in the mid-19th century, the late 1970s, and the present, considering what queer identity meant or means in each of these eras, particularly for people in rural, western US communities. Writer-director Travis Fine explains only at the end how the three narratives are connected, though he elicits some compelling rhymes between them throughout. The film centers on the theme of acceptance of transgender people (a worthy theme, given the dismaying prevalence of transphobia in media); the present-day narrative, about a young trans man who discovers self-respect at a live-in therapy center in Wyoming, provides the lens through which the other stories unfold. The title derives from a bit of Indigenous philosophy that an elderly Native American man passes down to a married, male painter grappling with his sexual identity in the 19th-century story: some people see the world with two eyes, one of them a male the other female. In this elder’s tribe, people with two eyes are considered unique and respected as such; Fine argues that the contemporary world could still benefit from this age-old wisdom. (2020, 95 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Sachs]

📽️ CRUCIAL VIEWING

CELLULOID IS AS GOOD AS TEN MOTHERS (Experimental)

Block Cinema (at Northwestern University) – Friday, 7pm (Free Admission)

Beloved projectionist Rebecca Lyon is leaving Block Cinema after ten years behind the reels. (Fret not, however; she's still in Chicago, programming and projecting for the Chicago Film Society and working at the Music Box Theatre.) Tonight Block hosts a 16mm program of films from some of Rebecca's favorite archives, the centerpiece of which is Les Blank's 1980 feature documentary GARLIC IS AS GOOD AS TEN MOTHERS (51 min), from Les Blank Films. This ode to the stinking rose will be preceded by Bruce Baillie's 1966 short LITTLE GIRL (10 min) and Kenneth Anger's 1972 film RABBIT'S MOON (16 min), both from Canyon Cinema, as well as Millie Goldsholl's 1963 short ENVELOPE JIVE (5 min), from Chicago Film Archives. These films illuminate what I love about Rebecca: her gentle eccentricity, her acerbic wit, and the attention she pays to details big and small. She appreciates the beauty of materials and the infinite ways they can be reborn again into something new and unusual. Everything in Rebecca's world has the potential to be cinematic, the mark of a true (and insanely talented) projectionist. She's also co-president, with me, of the Elliott Gould fan club, even though we've yet to hold a meeting, much less elections. Nevertheless, come out and celebrate her accordingly. [Kat Sachs]

Oscar Micheaux's WITHIN OUR GATES (US/Silent)

Chicago Film Society and Music Box Theatre – Monday, 7pm

During the Red Summer of 1919, the Chicago Race Riot awoke the nation from its foolish reverie; with 38 people dead and approximately 1,000 black families displaced, the riot in Chicago and others like it across the nation reflected the increased willingness amongst African Americans to fight back against institutionalized racial oppression. Made in 1919 and released in early 1920, WITHIN OUR GATES was appropriately timed against the conflict and also viewed as a direct response to D.W. Griffith's BIRTH OF A NATION (1915). Oscar Micheaux's second film tells the story of a black Southern school teacher, Sylvia, who goes North to seek funds for her school after the enrollment exceeds the money allotted per black child by the state. Along the way she falls in love with another idealist, and the story of her past is disclosed in a revelatory flashback: Sylvia was adopted by a black couple who are later lynched after her adoptive father is accused of killing his employer. Sylvia also escapes an attempted rape at the hands of her white birth father; between this and the lynching, the Board of Censors in Chicago and other cities initially rejected the film for fear that it would incite more racial violence. Shot mostly in Chicago, the film's sole print is the earliest surviving print of a feature film directed by an African American; it was discovered in Spain during the 1970s and restored by the Library of Congress is 1993. Micheaux's film is significant not only for its place within American film history, but also for the way it displays the complexity of race relations between people and regions. Featuring a live original score composed and performed by the Alvin Cobb, Jr. Trio. (1920, 79 min, 35mm) [Kat Sachs]

Pier Paolo Pasolini’s THE CANTERBURY TALES (Italy/France)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Wednesday, 7:30pm

“Chaucer foresees all the victories, all the triumphs of the bourgeoisie, but he also anticipates its inner rot,” said Pier Paolo Pasolini when he was making his film adaptation of The Canterbury Tales. “He’s a moralist, but he also has a sense of irony.” The darkest and most morbid of Pasolini’s “Trilogy of Life,” THE CANTERBURY TALES emphasizes the obsessions with theft, hypocrisy, and brutality that run through Chaucer’s 14th-century collection of narrative poems. The film delivers more of the earthy depictions of sex and other bodily functions that marked Pasolini’s THE DECAMERON (1971); however, the playful sensuality is offset by a joy-killing sense of punishment. Sadism is the order of the day here: beatings are plentiful, at least two gags involve someone farting in another person’s face, and a climactic scene at a brothel involves one customer asking to be whipped. It even culminates with a scatological vision of Hell in which the damned are shat aplenty out of Satan’s asshole—a foretaste of the horrific procession that would come in Pasolini’s apocalyptic final film SALÒ (1975). If that film represents Pasolini’s ultimate rejection of the modern world, THE CANTERBURY TALES finds the the poet/filmmaker/public intellectual looking back at the nascence of modernity with a more cheerful skepticism. The corrupting nature of money may be a theme in many of the tales Pasolini adapts (this theme may find its purest expression in the story where two university students seek “recompense” for the flour a miller has taken from them by sleeping with his wife and daughter); at the same time, the film retains much of Chaucer’s impish wit, particularly in the recurring mockery of Christian moralism. Also enlivening is the range of humanity within the cast, a combination of professional actors, semi-professionals who had worked with Pasolini before, and random people the director found on the streets of London. The variety of faces and body types—and the naturalistic way Pasolini presents them—suggests a painter’s eye more than a filmmaker’s, but the filmmaking is invigorating in its own right. Pasolini cut THE CANTERBURY TALES by almost half an hour between its premiere at the Berlin Film Festival (where it won the Golden Bear) and its general release, excising most of the interstitial scenes so that it seemed to jump randomly from one story to another. The film’s seemingly primitive form gives every shot a raw, rough-hewn quality. Screening as part of the Pier Paolo Pasolini series. (1972, 111 min, 35mm) [Ben Sachs]

Robert Altman's 3 WOMEN (US)

Music Box Theatre – Saturday and Sunday, 11:30am

Inspired by a dream, Robert Altman made a film that can only be explained using dream logic. Pinky (Sissy Spacek) starts out as a young, naive girl new to a bleak desert California outpost. She starts a job at a spa for seniors where she meets Millie (Shelly Duvall) and quickly attaches herself to her in an unhealthy way. They become roommates at a rundown apartment complex run by a sleazy former movie cowboy and his wife, Willie (Janice Rule), who’s pregnant and wanders around somnambulantly, painting mythological murals around the property. Each of the women is visually associated with a color at the beginning—Pinky’s red, Millie’s yellow, Willie’s blue. But colors, moods, even entire identities shift and switch as things go on. I’ve seen this film three or four times and fall under its trance/spell every time. Unencumbered by the constraints of somebody else’s screenplay, as he often was in much of his other work, Altman can free-associate dialogue and not worry at all about making narrative sense. There are resonances with films like Bunuel’s THAT OBSCURE OBJECT OF DESIRE (1977) and Polanski’s ROSEMARY’S BABY (1968) in the ways that male directors reckoned with the changing roles of women in contemporary society, but Altman’s take is more abstract and poetic. Still, it’s very much a man’s point of view that informs this almost entirely female-centric film. There’s an added interest to watching it now during another time of societal change in terms of gender roles. Or, you can just let its slippery vibe carry you off into the desert where these women may still be mutating into and out of one another to this day. Screening as part of the Music Box Staff Picks! series. (1977, 124 min, DCP Digital) [Dmitry Samarov]

Lotte Reiniger's THE ADVENTURES OF PRINCE ACHMED (Germany/Animation)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Thursday, 9:30pm

What is it specifically that draws the eye to silhouettes? From the groundbreaking early 20th century filmmaker Lotte Reiniger to contemporary artists such as Chicago-based multi-media group Manual Cinema and subversive silhouettist Kara Walker, there’s no denying that this art form, originating as far back as the 1st millennium BC with traditional shadow puppetry, is as complex in the way it’s created and the reactions it can evoke as it is simple in how it might appear to the casual observer. (Reiniger once referred to herself a “primitive cavemen artist,” speaking to the apparent simplicity of her modestly intricate cut-outs.) THE ADVENTURES OF PRINCE ACHMED is not just a prime example of the art form, but it also has the distinction of being the oldest surviving feature-length animation, a consequence worthy of Reiniger’s achievement, even if a technicality. With a picaresque story derived from Arabian Nights, the German filmmaker’s precise cut-outs—made using a variety of materials, including regular and tissue paper, cardboard, and metal—depict the eponymous Prince Achmed as he embarks on a multinational adventure, complete with evil demons and sexy princesses, following a run-in with a sorcerer and his flying horse. Textured, colored tinting backlight the filigreed silhouettes, making it look all too modern for a film that predates Disney’s SNOW WHITE by more than a decade. Reiniger made it over the course of four years using a painstaking technique similar to what’s now recognized as stop-motion animation—if the cinema is truth twenty-four times per second, imagine how honest she had to be to photograph it, frame by frame. Even more intriguing than Reiniger’s output is her background; having worked under famed theater director Max Reinhardt and expressionist filmmaker Paul Wegener, her sensibility is thus rooted more so in the avant-garde than any traditional mode. This makes THE ADVENTURES OF PRINCE ACHMED all the more exciting, likewise canonical and experimental, reflecting both Reiniger’s clear legacy and her shadowy legend. (1926, 67 min, 35mm) [Kat Sachs]

Jacques Rivette’s DUELLE (France)

Music Box Theatre – Tuesday, 7pm

Jacques Rivette understood that the magic of narrative cinema had little to do with narrative; rather, it came from the accumulation of gestures, fetish objects, and make-believe that rendered each movie a world unto itself. A follow-up to his greatest achievement, CELINE AND JULIE GO BOATING (1974), DUELLE was released along with NOROÎT in 1976 as parts of an intended quartet of films, but the third and fourth episodes were never made. In hindsight, the unfinished nature of the project seems to epitomize Rivette, who was known for his unresolved, yet remarkably intricate, conspiracy premises. DUELLE even goes so far as to invent its own cosmology, which involves immortal beings assuming human form in contemporary Paris, but the nature of the myth remains opaque until the end. As a storyteller, Rivette was more concerned with imagining complications than with connecting them, and this makes DUELLE feel like a Louis Feuillade serial, with the suggestion that the narrative innovations could spin out indefinitely. Enhancing the connection with silent cinema, Rivette had pianist Jean Wiener on set throughout the filming of DUELLE to accompany the action. As Henry Witt explained in his program notes for the UW Cinematheque, "Though always on-location when providing accompaniment, Wiener and his piano are only sometimes visible onscreen. His appearances vary from having entirely sensible diegetic motivations—performing at a nightclub, for instance—to the nonsensical, like when he appears midway through a private hotel room conversation... This slippery approach to the diegesis reflects the film’s handling of realism and fantasy generally." The cinematography, by regular Rivette collaborator William Lubtchansky, adds to the film's slippery nature. While it doesn't seem overtly fantastical, the photography nonetheless captures magic auras in real locations, like the great shafts of lights that shoot through a train station early on in the film or the glow off of fish tanks in a late-night aquarium sequence clearly indebted to Welles' THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI (1947). Such effects suggest (like the narrative itself) a supernatural presence lurking beneath the veneer of ordinary life; for Rivette, cinema had the power to bring that presence out into the open. Screening as part of the return of Highs & Lows, which includes several double features of “high” and “low” cinema (which one is which? That’s up to you!) through November 13. One admission provides entry to both films. (1976, 121 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Sachs]
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Screening after Andrew Fleming's 1996 teen horror film THE CRAFT (101 min, 35mm).

📽️ ALSO RECOMMENDED

Reginald Hudlin’s SIDNEY (US/Documentary)

Gene Siskel Film Center – See Venue website for showtimes

When Sidney Poitier was born two months prematurely in Miami while his parents were visiting from the Bahamas, he was not expected to live one day, let alone 94 years. Given the vast experiences Poitier would have during those nine decades, I’d say that he arrived early to get a running start. Reginald Hudlin’s comprehensive documentary SIDNEY tells in largely chronological order how a boy from Cat Island who had never seen a car or a mirror until he visited Nassau made his way out of the dangerously bigoted South to settle in New York City, lose his accent, and become one of the most ground-breaking actors of the 20th century. Through clips of his films, archival interview footage, and talking-head interviews not only with Poitier, but also with his two wives, his daughters, a boatload of artists who worked with him or were inspired by him (Louis Gossett Jr., Barbra Streisand, Morgan Freeman, Halle Berry, Spike Lee, Lenny Kravitz, to name a few), Oprah Winfrey, who produced the film, and Poitier biographer Aram Goudsouzian, we get a soup-to-nuts look at Poitier’s evolution as an actor, family man, and beacon for the civil rights movement. Most people will know of the criticism he endured from the Black community for saving Tony Curtis in THE DEFIANT ONES (1958) and for being a “Uncle Tom” for playing roles that catered to white audiences. Fewer will know about his marriage-wrecking love affair with Diahann Carroll, who costarred with him in PARIS BLUES (1961), and even fewer about his ambassadorships from the Bahamas to UNESCO and Japan and his British knighthood. These and other fascinating facts—and one chilling story of being stalked by racist police in the South—flesh out Poitier’s life and provide the salient details of how his uncompromising character was formed. If you’re interested in Poitier’s life, his artistry as an actor and director, and what he meant and continues to mean to the cause of racial justice in the world, POITIER is a must-see. (2022, 106 min, DCP Digital) [Marilyn Ferdinand]

Faraz Shariat’s NO HARD FEELINGS (Germany)

Goethe-Institut Chicago (150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 200) – Wednesday, 6pm (Free Admission)

Winner of the Teddy Award for Best Queer Film at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival, Faraz Shariat’s semi-autobiographical debut is a fizzy coming-of-age film with a poignant sociopolitical undertow, a paean to a young generation finding its way through the cultural barriers that still persist in our globalized world. When the film begins, the gay, twenty-something Parvis (Benjamin Radjaipour, savvily mingling callowness and warmth) isn’t quite ready to understand such inequity. Born in Germany to Iranian exiles, he’s lived with a sense of complacency entirely foreign to the hardscrabble experience of his refugee parents, who have only made things easier for him by fully embracing his homosexuality. Everything changes when Parvis steals a bottle of liquor from a bar, and he is sentenced to community service at a refugee detention facility. There, he is enlisted as a translator for Farsi-speaking inmates, including the spunky Banafshe and her brooding brother Amon. While Banafshe awaits a final decision on her potential deportation, Parvis and Amon carry out a steamy, covert romance; ultimately, it’s a sense of precarious social status, nebulous cultural affiliation, and intersectional identity that binds the three tenacious youths. Like Nadav Lapid’s SYNONYMS from last year, NO HARD FEELINGS is a distinctly 21st-century European societal portrait, concerned as it is with the disorienting displacement of refugees in the West, and the attendant dysphoria, xenophobia, and nationalism that reemerge in allegedly egalitarian places (“Yeah, I’m not usually into ethnic guys,” says Parvis’ white hookup). Also like Lapid’s film, NO HARD FEELINGS unfolds in a loose, at times seemingly improvisatory shape, with the narrative often halting to accommodate dreamy slow-motion dancing and pensive, semi-surreal tableaux, typically scored to an infectious nightclub beat. I’m not sure Shariat entirely pulls off these flourishes; they tend to flirt with music video aesthetics, while the director’s choice to shoot in Academy ratio (is this an art-film cliché yet?) can seem an odd affectation rather than a motivated decision. Then again, what’s wrong with music videos? NO HARD FEELINGS certainly captures the anthemic pop spirit of one, and it’s all too happy to make its queer, multicultural teens the proud stars. (2020, 92 min, Digital Projection) [Jonathan Leithold-Patt]

Tsai Ming-liang's DAYS (Taiwan)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Monday, 8pm

DAYS, Taiwanese master Tsai Ming-liang’s latest ode to urban loneliness, begins with a middle-aged man, Kang (Lee Kang-sheng), simply sitting in a room and staring out the window on a rainy afternoon. Tsai’s patient camera eye observes the man’s expressionless face for a full five minutes before cutting. It's an astonishing scene in which nothing seems to happen while also suggesting, on an interior level, that perhaps a lot is happening, thus setting the tone for the two-hour audio-visual experience that follows. As viewers, we are invited to not only observe Kang as the shot’s subject but also allow our eyes to wander around the beautifully composed frame, noticing the details of what is reflected in the window out of which Kang stares (since the shot is framed from outside) as well as listen to the sound of the gently falling rain. From there, an almost entirely wordless narrative proceeds, in fits and starts, as the daily life of this man, who is suffering from and being treated for an unspecified illness, is juxtaposed with that of a younger man, a Laotian immigrant masseur named Non (Anong Houngheuangsya). Eventually, the lives of both protagonists come together in an erotic hotel-room encounter before breaking apart again, presumably for good. The way these two minimalist character arcs briefly intersect reveals a surprisingly elegant and classical structure lurking beneath the movie's avant-garde surface and also serves to function as a potent metaphor for nothing less than life itself: We may be born alone and we may die alone but, if we're lucky, we can make meaningful connections with other people along the way. DAYS is a formally extreme film, even for Tsai, and probably not the best place to start for those unfamiliar with the director's previous work. But I emerged from it feeling as refreshed and energized as I would if I had visited a spa. Screening as part of the Tsai Ming-Liang series. (2020, 127 min, DCP Digital) [Michael Glover Smith]

Jackie Chan's POLICE STORY (Hong Kong)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Wednesday, 7pm

The dubbed thwapping of Jackie Chan’s artfully choreographed fight scenes is a form of ASMR I didn’t know existed. His film POLICE STORY is as tranquilizing as it is rousing, a veritable ballet of brutality with elements of comedy and romance thrown into the mix. Recently restored by Janus Films in high-definition 4K, the first film in the Hong Kong superstar’s popular action series is relentlessly entertaining, so much so that it’s almost difficult to critique. It's best seen as an artifact of Chan’s prodigious career, which is marked by a skillfulness that’s beyond one’s wildest imagination, rendered so flawlessly that it would seem as if anyone could do what he does. Though often compared to Buster Keaton for his stunts—some of Chan’s acts (which the actor famously performs himself) are almost direct corollaries to Keaton’s—Chan is also similar to Keaton in that he’s directed much of his own best work, having made POLICE STORY after working with James Glickenhaus on THE PROTECTOR (also 1985), which was intended but failed to launch Chan’s career in the United States. The film took Chan back to Hong Kong; it premiered at the 1987 New York Film Festival, where, ironically, it did much more than THE PROTECTOR to grow his Stateside reputation. In the film, he stars as a young police inspector, Chan Ka Kui, who’s assigned to guard a crime lord’s secretary (Taiwanese icon Brigitte Lin) after she’s strong-armed into testifying against her former boss. The incomparable Maggie Cheung, whose comedic tenor rivals Chan’s own, also appears as the inspector’s girlfriend. A Jackie Chan film often feels like skipping a stone across water, each plunk a show-stopping set piece separated by passages of anticipation; that is to say, the plot, while entertaining, is largely filler until the next conflict, which inevitably yields stunts as yet unimaginable to the average moviegoer. Chan eschews the slow-build in favor of immediate, heart-stopping action, destroying a whole shantytown in the first 15 minutes as ceaselessly as he destroys a luxury mall in the last 15 minutes. (1985, 92 min, DCP Digital) [Kat Sachs]

Hayo Miyazaki's KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE [English Dubbed Version] (Japan/Animation)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Saturday and Sunday, 11am

In movies about witchcraft, especially those centered on female teenage protagonists, magic is often a metaphor for the emotional vicissitude that is coming of age. The same is true of KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE, except that its director, Hayao Miyazaki, extends it to also include the young witch’s pragmatic development. In this world, derived from Eiko Kadono’s eponymous novel, witchcraft is as much an amendable skill as it is an innate gift; Kiki has a knack for flying (using a broomstick, as a witch does), and her mother is shown using her own magic to brew medicine for the locals. Though their skills are otherworldly in nature, it’s required that witches leave home at 13 to find a town that doesn’t have any witch inhabitants and make a living using their powers. With her sassy black cat Jiji in tow, Kiki starts her own delivery service, transporting various items around town with minimal effort but maximum mishaps. As is the norm with Miyazaki, there is no easy fix for Kiki’s problems—magic, unfortunately, can’t replace tenacity or account for a lack of self-esteem. “Magic in the film is a limited power no different from the talents of any average kids,” he wrote in a director's statement for its DVD release. About Kiki’s gender, which is an identifying factor of the film, that it’s concerned so intently with a young girl’s maturation, Miyazaki also said that “[s]he represents every girl who is drawn to the glamour of the big city but finds themselves struggling with their newfound independence.” This reflects the conflict between tradition and modernity that’s common in much of Miyazaki’s work. Also present is a preoccupation with flight that started in his childhood—his father manufactured fighter plane rudders during World War II. Despite said fascination, he does not give Kiki her powers so easily. At one point, she loses them altogether; talented painter and new friend Ursula tells Kiki that the same happens to her, that sometimes she’s completely unable to create. The film’s profound display of maturity and all that precedes its acquirement is standard for Studio Ghibli fare but decidedly less so for childrens' films in general. Its happy ending is predicated on the understanding that to be happy, one must persevere through bad times, sad times, and any doldrums in between. As always, its animation style is wholly ataractic, much like the Romantic and Impressionist painters beyond whose captivating canvases lay a whole complex world, both halcyon and tremulous, as honest as they are illusory in their artistic dissimulation. (The novel on which it’s based is set in northern Europe, and Miyazaki cited a couple of cities in Sweden as influences on the design. Yet another hat tip to the idea that even the most tranquil seas swell from time to time.) It’s the first Ghibli film distributed by Disney, a partnership that’s only recently come to an end with Disney granting home media distribution rights of the studio’s films to GKIDS, who’ve held the theatrical distribution rights since 2011. Miyazaki originally intended to just produce the film but decided to direct after being reluctant to cede his vision for the project. One can only assume that Kiki, in all her dewy wisdom, would do the same as it pertains to her witchy industry. Final note—and a spoiler: Perhaps the most heartbreaking-to-me scene in cinema is when Kiki stops being able to speak with Jiji, who’d previously been able to talk to her as if he was another human. If there’s a more apt metaphor for the transition from adolescence to adulthood, I have yet to hear of it. Still, though the magic of childhood may cease, there’s still some to be found on the other side. (1989, 103 min, DCP Digital) [Kat Sachs]

Na Hong-jin's THE WAILING (South Korea)

Facets Cinema – Thursday, 7pm

Released eight years after his essential borderline Korean New Wave film THE CHASER, Na Hong-jin’s THE WAILING maintains the grittiness and democratic ideologies that made the Korean New Wave so popular in the first place. A supernatural thriller/mystery, WAILING follows a police officer and his family as his village is besieged by a demon that possesses people who later go crazy and murder their families. Na draws heavy inspiration from Joon-ho Bong’s THE HOST as a family’s bonds are tested against a seemingly unstoppable entity. The central family unit is the film’s strongest asset. The father’s duty to protect his kin from evil drives the action. Religious themes are explored and the dichotomy of spiritualism and Catholicism create a gripping juxtaposition. Na examines mankind’s innate urges to believe in something and the willingness people have to change their stances, for better or worse, when evidence arises to contradict their previous views. The audience is tormented and misled when tensions rise, and the suspense becomes palpable to a nearly eye-covering degree. The distrust sown in the viewer results in a questioning of everything onscreen and creates feelings of isolation. THE WAILING is a psychological mystery teetering on the edge of horror that promises to baffle from start to finish. (2016, 156 min, Digital Projection) [Kyle Cubr]

Gil Junger's 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU (US)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Thursday, 7pm

The turn of the 21st century brought a plethora of Shakespeare adaptations to the big screen. Not that this was anything new—the Bard has been adapted since the beginning of cinema. But there’s a particular zealousness with which this period produced these, from highbrow Oscar-winning films like SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE (1998) to avant-garde visual feasts like Julie Taymor’s TITUS (1999). Transplanting The Taming of the Shrew to an upper-middle-class Seattle high school, the teen comedy 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU stands out among these as an adaptation that feels particular to its late-90s moment and still timeless. Bianca (Larissa Oleynik) is desperate to start dating; her overprotective father (Larry Miller) decides that she can–only when her older sister does. The problem is that the intense Kat (Julia Stiles, who starred in two other Shakespeare adaptations around this time, Michael Almereyda’s HAMLET and the dark teen drama O) is a Sylvia Plath-reading, Letters to Cleo-listening misanthrope who has no interest in dating. New student Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), himself crushing on Bianca, comes up with an elaborate plan to bribe brooding troublemaker Patrick (an impossibly charming Heath Ledger, in his introduction to American audiences) to take Kat out; of course, things don’t go as planned. Subtly highlighting the tumultuous relationship of the sisters, 10 THING I HATE ABOUT YOU feels more grounded than some of the other teen comedies coming out around this time–in this way it feels like the late-90s descendant of the Jane Austen adaptation CLUELESS (1995). But, like CLUELESS, amidst the core drama is an abundance of delightful characters, including a hilarious romance novel-writing guidance counselor played by Allison Janney and Cameron’s accommodating co-conspirator (David Krumholtz). It effortlessly balances quirky moments with sincerely emotional ones, making 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU a teen comedy touchstone. (1999, 97 min, DCP Digital) [Megan Fariello]

Lewis Klahr’s FALSE AGING (US/Experimental Short)

Corbett vs. Dempsey (2156 W. Fulton St.) – Tuesday through Saturday, 10am – 5pm

Combining whimsy and wistfulness, prolific experimental filmmaker Lewis Klahr tackles the experience of aging in FALSE AGING, a short film in three parts that combines animation and collage. Artist/filmmaker Joseph Cornell could have been an inspiration for Klahr, but the latter skews much more pessimistic than the sunny Cornell. Part one focuses on leaving the nest, exemplified by homey wallpaper and the recurring images of migratory birds as Dionne Warwick sings “(Theme From) VALLEY OF THE DOLLS.” The theme, hailing from a tragic film about young women assuming adult responsibilities and finding all is not as they dreamed it would be, might as well be screaming “go back!” Another sad entry into adulthood is narrated by Grace Slick’s intense rendering of “Lather,” a case of arrested development imagined by Klahr as the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. The final part takes place in the Big City, as John Cale recites Andy Warhol’s aggrieved diary entry “A Dream” from his and Lou Reed’s album Songs for Drella. Klahr uses an alarm clock on which a round object rotates like a second hand to segue between the film’s segments. Amusingly, when Slick sings that Lather draws mountains that look like bumps, a tiny, plastic woman with well-formed breasts emerges from a slit in the background paper. Klahr reclaims the past with the recurring image of an obsolete points program—a redemption book filled with stamps earned from purchases. Warhol’s final lament from his diary that no one invites him out or comes to see him anymore is a warning that old age and infirmity know no friends. The naïveté and immaturity of each of the sung and spoken narratives suggest that the concept of aging truly is false to our understanding of ourselves. Screening in the Vault through October 8. (2008, 15 min, Digital Projection) [Marilyn Ferdinand]

John Patton Ford's EMILY THE CRIMINAL (US)

Facets Cinema – See Venue website for showtimes

Emily (Aubrey Plaza) is a transplant to Los Angeles, an art school graduate carrying $70,000 in tuition debt, a hothead with a DUI and a criminal assault conviction on her record, and virtually no prospects for landing a decent job in her chosen field. Welcome to American capitalism in the 21st century and the devaluation of the arts, higher education, and people who work for a living. In his feature film debut as director and screenwriter, John Patton Ford has taken the contemporary social landscape in the United States and used its inequities to turn out a boots-on-the-ground crime thriller that does an admirable job of keeping the audience on the edge of their seats. We understand Emily’s righteous indignation at being sandbagged by job interviewers, her contracting employer at a food catering company who denies her the rights of a full-time employee, and a friend who has “made it” and dangles prospects of a job in front of her without being able to deliver. No wonder she gets involved in credit card fraud—it’s a better living than the straight world will ever offer her. Plaza is incredibly good as she climbs carefully, then recklessly down the stairs to the underworld. But then who wouldn’t follow the handsome, charismatic leader of this criminal enterprise, Youcef (Theo Rossi), who praises her and mentors her for the advantages her young, pretty, white face can offer. Emily may have thought she was an artist when she started out, but there’s no question that her real life’s work is as a criminal. If you start rooting for her because you can relate to her story, remember that little fact. (2022, 93 min, DCP Digital) [Marilyn Ferdinand]

🎞️ PHYSICAL SCREENINGS/EVENTS – ALSO SCREENING

⚫ Asian Pop-Up Cinema
The extensive Asian Pop-Up Cinema series continues its fifteenth season. Their in-person and virtual offerings are too many to list. Visit here for more information.

⚫ Comfort Film at Comfort Station (2579 N. Milwaukee Ave.)
Richard Lowry’s 1986 film HAWK JONES (88 min, Digital Projection) screens on Wednesday, 8pm, as part of the “Released and Abandoned: Forgotten Oddities of the Home Video Era” series. Free admission. More info here.

⚫ Gene Siskel Film Center
Kathleen Hughes and Abigail Disney’s 2022 documentary THE AMERICAN DREAM AND OTHER FAIRY TALES (87 min, DCP Digital) opens, and Salomé Jashi’s 2022 Georgian documentary TAMING THE GARDEN (92 min, DCP Digital) and Juan Pablo Gonzalez’s 2022 Mexican film DOS ESTACIONES (97 min, DCP Digital) continue.

Joe Winston’s 2021 documentary PUNCH 9 FOR HAROLD WASHINGTON (103 min, DCP Digital) screens on Friday at 7pm. Director Winston and producer Raymond C. Lambert will be in attendance for a post-screening Q&A. 

Yorgos Lanthimos’ 2009 Greek film DOGTOOTH (97 min, 35mm) screens on Monday, 6pm, as part of 50/50, the Siskel’s year-long series including a film from each year the theater has been open.More info on all screenings here.

⚫ Music Box Theatre
The Music Box Garden Movies continue. See Venue website for films and showtimes.

Ti West’s 2022 horror film PEARL (102 min, DCP Digital) continues, and Brett Morgen’s 2022 documentary about David Bowie, MOONAGE DAYDREAM (135 min, DCP Digital) opens.

Catherine Hardwicke’s 2008 teen horror film TWILIGHT (122 min, DCP Digital) screens Friday at midnight, and Jim Sharman’s 1975 cult classic THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (100 min, 35mm) screens Saturday at midnight.

On Tuesday at 7pm, director Greg Sestero will attend a screening of his new film MIRACLE VALLEY (2021, 90 min, DCP Digital). It will be followed by a screening of Tommy Wiseau’s 2003 cult classic THE ROOM (93 min, 35mm), in which Sestero appeared.

The Blue Whiskey Independent Film Festival will present the 1922 Cinema Centennial on Wednesday at 7pm, with three works from one hundred years ago: the short films BUBBLES (7 min, Digital Projection) and OUR GANG (15 min, Digital Projection) and the feature OLIVER TWIST (75 min, 16mm). More info on all screenings here.

🎞️ LOCAL ONLINE SCREENINGS – ALSO SCREENING/STREAMING

⚫ Media Burn Archive
On Thursday at 6pm, Media Burn Archive is hosting a three-part virtual program in support of BARRIO TELEVISION, a documentary about the incredible story of Realidades, the first prime-time TV program for Puerto Ricans in New York and the first national and bilingual news series by, for and about Latinos in the country. The virtual event will include a screening of Realidades, a first look at documentary footage connected to BARRIO TELEVISION, and a Q&A with the documentary’s director, Christina DiPasquale. Funds donated during the event will go directly to the making of the film. More info here.

⚫ Video Data Bank
“‘Make Believe, It’s Just like the Truth Clings to It’: In Conversation with the Work of Cecilia Dougherty,” curated by Amanda Mendelsohn, is available to stream for free on VDB TV. The program includes Dougherty’s THE DRAMA OF THE GIFTED CHILD (1992, 6 min); MY FAILURE TO ASSIMILATE (1995, 20 min); THE DREAM AND THE WAKING (1997, 15 min); and GONE (2001, 36 min). More info here.

CINE-LIST: September 23 - September 29, 2022

MANAGING EDITORS // Ben and Kat Sachs

CONTRIBUTORS // Cody Corrall, Kyle Cubr, Megan Fariello, Marilyn Ferdinand, Jonathan Leithold-Patt, Dmitry Samarov, Michael Glover Smith, Drew Van Weelden