Talking Screens, A Week In Chicago Film, September 8-14, 2023
The studios are still in the doldrums, with no big releases on the horizon and no settlement in the Hollywood strikes past a hundred days. Here’s how obstinate they are, reports Variety: Warner Bros. Discovery just reported an expected loss of up to half-a-billion-dollars in earnings for the rest of the year, while the estimate of agreeing to the demand from striking writers and actors would have cost around… $50 million.
“My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3” brings writer-director-star Nia Vardalos back to the cross-cultural malaprop business: I still recollect Tom Hanks telling me after the first film’s release that co-producer Rita Wilson would net her (and them) more than he had ever made on a single film. In theaters.
The Rivette revival in theaters and physical media and on streaming does not go so far as “The Nun II“: Instead, it’s an American horror entry! “In 1956 France, a priest is violently murdered, and Sister Irene begins to investigate. She once again comes face-to-face with a powerful evil.” In theaters.
“Fremont”
Babak Jalali’s “Fremont” is a black-and-white diversion of immigrant experience, a sweet, simmering patch of modest storytelling, its intimacy growing in sensation as it progresses. Purposeful meandering suggests early Jarmusch, but there’s no need to compare “Fremont”‘s story of a young Afghan immigrant to his work. Donya seeks comfort; what we find is a comforting, even universal tale. With Anaita Wali Zada, Gregg Turkington, Jeremy Allen White. Music Box, opens Friday, September 8.
“Rotting In The Sun”
King of cringe comedy Sebastián Silva’s “Rotting In The Sun” is a withering satire of self-commodification without self-reflection, ranging from naughty to nasty; ambitious and ragged; from fuckery to fucking; and back again, has its fierce, small rewards in a welter of notions. Laughed a little, groaned big a couple times, cringed a lot. With Silva, Jordan Firstman, Catalina Saavedra. Music Box, opens Friday, September 8.
Godard famously quipped that a movie has a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order. A Béla Tarr movie has rain, wind and despair, but not necessarily in that order. Plus: duration! The Hungarian director-turned-mentor of “The Werckmeister Harmonies” (2000, Ágnes Hranitzky, co-director), elongates ideas of time and representation through duration, and camera movement, and music. “Werckmeister,” composed of thirty-nine unbroken takes, opens with an extended traveling shot, an incredible, orchestrated dance of figures and camera in a small-town hard-drinking old man’s bar, that while influenced by Tarr’s Hungarian predecessors like Miklos Jancso, follows the characters as they attempt to describe the creation of the world through the dance of the camera. It’s the music of this sphere. 4K digital restoration. Siskel, opens Friday, September 8.
CHICAGO SEEN
“Hello, Dankness” opens CUFF 30.
The thirtieth edition of Chicago Underground opens Wednesday at Siskel, then moves to the newly refurbished 107-year-old Harper Theater in Hyde Park. Our extended interview with festival artistic director Bryan Wendorf is in our Fall Preview issue and here. A list of events and parties, with complete listings, is here.
“Eric Larue”
Chicago International Film Fest Sets Michael Shannon Directorial Debut; Fincher’s “The Killer”; “Rustin”; Cannes Highlights
The fifty-ninth Chicago International FilmFestival, has announced early highlights of what North America’s oldest competitive film fest will be showing October 11-22. Chicago actor Michael Shannon will appear October 13 with his directorial debut, “Eric Larue,” adapted from Brett Neveu’s 2002 play which had its bow at Shannon’s A Red Orchid Theatre in Chicago, following a mother’s reaction to a shooting spree by her son, and starring Judy Greer, Alexander Skarsgård, Paul Sparks, Alison Pill, and Tracy Letts. The Festival Centerpiece film is “Saltburn,” a tale of privilege in England, starring Barry Keoghan (“Banshees Of Inisherin”) and Jacob Elordi (“Priscilla”), written and directed by Emerald Fennell (“Promising Young Woman”). David Fincher’s “The Killer,” partially shot in Chicago, stars Michael Fassbender in a satirical take of the assassin genre. Also: Palme d’Or winner “Anatomy of A Fall,” by Justine Triet and Cannes Grand Prix award-winner, World War II drama “The Zone Of Interest,” from writer-director Jonathan Glazer. And: George C. Wolfe’s portrait of organizer Bayard Rustin, “Rustin.” Venues include AMC’s NEWCITY 14, the Music Box, the Siskel Film Center, the Chicago History Museum, the Hamilton Park Cultural Center in Englewood, Harrison Park in Pilsen, the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, as well as some selections shown virtually. More here.
Doc Films needs fall volunteers: They’re giving preference to students, but Doc Films is open to others volunteering at Ida Noyes this autumn. Application here.
The first of several celebrations of Chicago Filmmakers’ fiftieth anniversary comes this Saturday, September 9, 2pm-6pm, at a fundraising event at Le Piano. The afternoon’s honorees include Sharon Zurek, Christine Dudley, Joe Chappelle and Colleen Griffen, whose generous contributions and passion for building community have had an important impact on the Chicago film scene. More here.
REPERTORY & REVIVALS
The “Contra/Banned” series continues at Siskel; the highlight is a rare 16mm projection of Jack Smith’s groundbreaking 1963 “Flaming Creatures.” “Promptly after the premiere of ‘Flaming Creatures’—Smith’s orgiastic, messy tangle of bodies, lipstick, and vampires—at the Bleecker Street Cinema in New York City, police arrived at the theater and seized the print, and the film was banned across the country and internationally. Filmmaker Jonas Mekas, who was charged with violating New York’s obscenity laws for screening the film in 1964, wrote in Film Comment of his arrest, ‘It is my duty as an artist and as a man to show the best work of my contemporaries to the people. It is my duty to bring to your attention the ridiculousness and illegality of the licensing and obscenity laws. The duty of the artist is to ignore bad laws and fight them every moment of his life. All works of art, all expressions of man’s spirit must be permitted, must be available to the people. In what times do we live, when works of art are identified with the workings of crime? What a beautiful insanity!'” Siskel, Monday, September 11, 8:30pm.
A collection of shorts by Apichatpong “Joe” Weerasethakul includes “Thirdworld” (1999, Thailand), “Emerald” (2008), “Vapour” (2015), “Mobile Men” (2018) and “Blue” (2018). Weerasethakul will appear for discussion by Zoom. Siskel, Tuesday, September 12, 6pm.
Chicago Film Society presents film pioneer Oscar Micheaux’s 1925 “Body and Soul” (35mm). “‘Body and Soul’ is one of three Micheaux silent features (out of twenty-six) to survive today, and the only one that comes down to us in reasonably authentic form, retaining the original color tints and the dialect-heavy intertitles.” Presented with an original film score will be performed live by the Alvin Cobb, Jr. Trio, a group led by drummer-composer Alvin Cobb, Jr. and featuring bassist-vocalist Katie Ernst and pianist Julius Tucker. Chicago Film Society at the Music Box, Tuesday, September 12, 7pm.
The Music Box Billy Wilder matinee is “Witness For The Prosecution” (35mm), September 9-10, 11:30am.
Peter Berlin is “That Boy”
A return engagement in the small room at the Box: “Iconic gay sex symbol Peter Berlin writes, directs, produces, edits, and stars in ‘That Boy‘ as Helmut, a German Adonis admired and desired by every person he comes in contact with—including members of the Cockettes—but who only loves the blind boy who can’t judge him for his looks and won’t see them fade with age. One of the more unusual and artistically ambitious films to come out of San Francisco’s gay underground film scene, ‘That Boy’ is a singular tribute to narcissism that has been newly restored in 2K by Vinegar Syndrome from the long-lost original 16mm camera negative.” (A rich Apartamento interview with Berlin is here.) Presented by Front Row and Henry Hanson at the Music Box, Sunday, September 10, 9:30pm.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
Talking Screens, September 1-7, 2023: "Contra/Banned" at Siskel | Hip-Hop History at Music Box | Roots of Noir at Doc Films This week: "Between Two Worlds" at Landmark Century; "The Wicker Man: The Final Cut" and "Full Metal Jacket" at Drafthouse; ten-film "Contra/Banned" series at Siskel; "Fresh Films: A Celebration of Fifty Years Of Hip Hop" series, plus "Sabrina," "Perfect Blue," "The Room," "Oppenheimer," "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2," "Josie and The Pussycats," "The Age Of Innocence," "Perpetrator" and "Sorcerer" at…
