1 The Volcanic Anna Magnani (Siskel, July) From Italy with gusto: twelve roles by one of the fiercest females in film history; often heartbreaking and heart-punching in a single breath or flash of the eyes.
2 Noir City Film Festival (Music Box, August 19-25) The return of nights dark and sinister in an annual compilation of newly found films and classics from the backstreets of the twentieth century
3 Chicago Underground Film Festival (Logan Theatre, June 1-5) The world’s oldest underground film festival turns twenty-three, earnestly expanding the creative boundaries of contemporary narrative and experimental storytelling.
4 Indignation (July)
Ang Lee’s screenwriter-producer/Dreyer scholar/studio executive extraordinaire James Schamus turns first-time director at the fine age of fifty-six in an adaptation of Philip Roth’s 2008 novel, starring Logan Lerman, Sarah Gadon, and in a show-stopping extended confrontation, Chicago’s own Tracy Letts
5
De Palma
(Music Box, June)
Filmmakers Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow take a cue from the decades-long French “Cinéma, de notre temps” series of director profile-interviews in a 111-minute survey of the talented filmmaker’s long career. Also being shown: “The Phantom of Paradise,” “The Untouchables,” “Dressed To Kill,” “Body Double,” more.
Film Top 5: May 2018 Cinema from Euro elders, including Philippe Garrel, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Paul Schrader, Wim Wenders and a look at the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Film Top 5: September 2020 Charlie Kaufman thinks, once more, as always, of ending it all; whimsitician Miranda July returns; Chicago Latino Film Festival goes virtual; Gerard Butler may or may not save the planet from a comet; and "Tenet" promises to time-invert over Labor Day in non-pandemic hotspot localities.
Film Top 5: October 2020 Chicago International, "Chicago 7" and "Candyman"'s Chicago; plus "WW1984" braces for social distancing and Kenneth Branagh again tunes up the tonsorial folderol as Hercule Poirot.
Film Top 5: March 2020 Eleven films on 70; forty-seven films from twenty-seven EU nations; and three singularities from Romania, the bayou and Chicago, Illinois.
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