The 52nd edition of the Chicago International Film Festival kicks off Thursday, Oct. 13, with the Chicago premiere of director Damien Chazelle's ( Whiplash ) musical valentine La La Land, which has wowed festival audiences and stars Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone as two LA dreamersa jazz pianist and a budding actress with a thing for classic movie stars.
The fest, which continues through Oct. 27, offers many more first look premieres at some of fall's most anticipated movieswith Moonlight, sure to be director Barry Jenkins's breakthrough film ( see capsule review below ); Jackie, starring Natalie Portman as Jackie Kennedy in the days following JFK's assassination; and Arrival, the sci-fi thriller with Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner, topping my list.
Another must-see film is A Quiet Passion, from British out writer-director Terence Davies; it's a lesbian-tinged version of the life of poet Emily Dickinson. Dickinson is portrayed by out actor Cynthia Nixon, who is scheduled to attend the screening.
The festival also includes in-person career retrospective tributes to screen legends Geraldine Chaplin ( Doctor Zhivago, Nashville ) and Peter Bogdanovich ( The Last Picture Show, Paper Moon, What's Up Doc? ) as well as 12 Years a Slave director Steve McQueen. Empire star Taraji P. Henson will also be on hand for what promises to be a lively conversation, along with sneak peeks from her upcoming film Hidden Figures.
A 25th-anniversary screening ( with a restored print ) of director Julie Dash's African-American classic Daughters of the Dust and a 30th-anniversary screening of the terrifying John McNaughton chiller Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer are also in the lineup. An advance screening of the forthcoming HBO documentary Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds ( see capsule review below ) and I Am Not Your Negrowhich focuses on gay writer James Baldwin's unfinished last work, Remember This House, an examination of the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Medgar Evers and Malcolm Xare two more on my must-see list.
The aforementioned Moonlight, A Quiet Passion and South Korean writer-director Park Chan-Wook's latest, The Handmaiden ( a standout at Cannes ) have LGBT characters and themes while 11 other films in the festival have been grouped in CIFF's "Outlook" section, devoted to showcasing queer cinema. Synopses ( courtesy of fest materials ) and capsule reviews of some of these titles and a few others I've already seen are detailed below. Complete festival listings, advance tickets and more at ChicagoFilmFestival.com .
Being 17This romantic coming-out drama gives us two adorable high-school twinks for the price of one. It is the latest from French queer auteur Andre Techine, who co-wrote the screenplay with another out writer-director, Celine Sciamma ( Tomboy; Water Lilies )which makes the urgency to see this all the more pressing for LGBTQ cinema fans. In French. Screening 10/23 and 10/24; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/being-17/
Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie ReynoldsAfter Fisher's lightly fictionalized Postcards from the Edge and her more recent one-woman show Wishful Drinking, one would have thought we'd discovered just about everything there was to know about show business' second most famous mother-daughter. ( I would count Mommie Dearest's Joan and Christina Crawford as number one. )
However, that notion is belied but quick in this charming and surprisingly heartfelt documentary portrait from co-directors Fisher Stevens and Alexis Bloom. Fishermovie royalty thanks to her portrayal of Princess Leia in the Star Wars epicsand Reynolds ( the same ) are the human embodiment of the "the show must go on" maxim. This screening is well in advance of its early winter HBO premiere. Screening 10/19 and 10/20; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/bright-lights-starring-carrie-fisher-and-debbie-reynolds/
I Promise You AnarchyMiguel, an aimless skateboarder from a middle-class family in Mexico City, copes with his bored existence by getting high and engaging in sex with his bisexual best friend on the down low, paying for the easy life by running an illegal blood bank for the drug cartels. When things take a sinister turn, Miguelan antihero if there ever was onemakes increasingly terrible choices and the film veers from a Gus Van Sant-like study of disaffected youth to a quasi-thriller, the latter of which never quick pays off as the truly horrific situation tantalizes. In Spanish. Screening Oct. 19, 21, 22. ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/i-promise-you-anarchy/
MilesFormer Chicagoan/out writer-director Nathan Adloff follows his delightfully eccentric debut feature, Nate & Margaret, with this black comedy based on his own life. Tim Boardman stands in for Adloff as Miles, a young teen who just came out and who's stuck in small-town Illinois; he yearns to go to Chicagoand film schoolas a way to escape his dreary existence.
Molly Shannon plays Miles' recently widowed mother who discovers that her late husband spent Miles' college tuition on his mistress. Miles joins the girls' volleyball teamhis only option for winning a scholarship to pay for film school. Naturally, this causes plenty of havoc in the conservative little town, pitting all and sundry against Miles, mom and his upbeat coach ( a winning Missi Pyle ). It's filled to the gills with expert comic actors supporting Shannon and Boardman ( Yeardley Smith, Paul Reiser, Ethan Phillips, Annie Golden, Romy Rosemont and Stephen Root ), but the film doesn't quite live up to its delightful premise and kinda fritters away, although the relationship between Shannon ( whose wondrous ) and Boardman rings true. Screening 10/18 and 10/19; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/miles/
MoonlightWriter-Director Barry Jenkins' moviean adaptation of Tarell Alvin McCraney's play Black Boys Look Blue in the Moonlightis sensational. It focuses on the incredibly fraught life of Chiron, a young gay Black man captured at three key stages in his life. This triptych is essayed by three different actors ( Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes ) who turn in riveting performances. Naomie Harris, as Chiron's drug-addled mother; Mahershala Ali, as a drug kingpin; and Andre Holland, as Chiron's friend Kevin are no less compelling. Jenkins, Harris, Holland and McCraney are scheduled to attend the Oct. 24 screening. ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/moonlight/
Paris 05:59Yes, it's just as explicit as you've heard. The first 20 minutes or so of this French erotic drama takes place in a gay sex club in Paris with practically nothing left to the imagination. After we've watched Theo and Hugo go at it in the midst of an orgy and they are heading their separate ways in the wee hours, they decide on the spur of the moment to grab a bite to eat and get to know each other.
When the two met anonymously at the club, the time was 4:27 a.m.; by the time the film concludesin real time 93 minutes later, at 5:59 ( hence the title )Theo and Hugo will have found much more than sexual desire in common. Comparisons to Andrew Haigh's Weekend and his recently concluded HBO series Looking were perhaps inevitable, as co-writer/directors Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau's must have known when they were creating the film.
However, this is much more than a pale imitation of Haigh's work and there is a sweetness to these characters and a refreshing matter-of-factness to their situation from the supporting characters that lend much more than a portrait of Theo and Hugo as they grope toward a relationship. We also get a lovely snapshot of the attitudesmostly positiveof gay people in urban Paris. Vive La France! In French. Screens 10/15 and 10/16; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/paris-0559/
Pushing DeadFrom writer-director Tom E. Brown comes this droll black comedy that follows Dan ( James Roday ), a low-key, blocked writer who has been HIV-positive for decades, trying to renew needed prescription medication when the gift of a $100 birthday check from his mother puts his income into a category that changes his insurance status. Quirky charactersBob, the bar owner Dan works part time for ( Danny Glover ); testy wife Dot ( Khandi Alexander ), who wants to leave Bob; his chronically single roommate ( Robin Weigert ); and Mike ( Tom Riley ), a new guy he's interested inhelp enliven the amiable pacing of Brown's movie. It's hard to imagine a gentle comedy being made about HIV and the Kafkaesque insurance industry, but here it is. Screening 10/18, 10/22, 10/23; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/pushing-dead/
Strike a PoseTwenty-five years after Madonna's Truth or Dare documentary and her Blond Ambition tour, filmmakers Ester Gold and Reijer Zwaan brought together her male backup dancers for a reunion. A look back at what was a career and life highlight for the mostly gay men and their ensuing struggles are detailed in this lively and, at times, sobering film that would be much, much more enticing if Madonna had shown up for the reunion. Her unexplained absence is, oddly never discussedleaving a hole at the center of the movie. Screening 10/22 and 10/23; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/strike-a-pose/
Utopians: Director's CutFrom Hong Kong queer auteur Scud comes another sexy treatise on love and lust, with a bevy of nude men front and center ( pun intended ). When a sexually adventurous college professor announces to his class that he's gay, one of his conservative male studentswho has been having erotic gay dreams and avoiding relations with his girlfriendtimidly begins to accept his same-sex desires.
The professor, espousing the old Rocky Horror maxim "don't dream it, be it" and removing his clothes at every possible opportunity, endeavors to help the young man realize his sexual dreams. The young man's journey to "utopia" is equal parts sexy and silly, and not nearly as diverting or visually gorgeous as previous Scud outings.
Women Who KillBrooklyn-based Jean and Morgan, former life partners, host a cult podcast about female serial killers and, between broadcasts, volunteer at a local food bank. But when Morgan falls for a woman she meets at the co-op, Jean's suspicions are aroused and she begins to investigate. The deadest of deadpan comedies, this intermittently amusing film will surely please the NPR crowd; however, its limpid pacing and dry-as-toast performances left me cold. Screening 10/18, 10/19; ChicagoFilmFestival.com/film/women-who-kill/
Complete festival schedule and advance tickets are at ChicagoFilmFestival.com .