Chicago International Film Festival 2018 Report

Every year for 54 years, cinephiles from around the world gather in dimly lit theaters in Chicago to bear witness to the new wonders that cinema can bring. This is the 54th year of The Chicago International Film Festival, and it is with great honor that Film Inquiry is here to bear witness to as many of the 120+ films selected to be featured by Cinema/Chicago as possible.

Here, you will find quick little snapshots from the films that I can’t quite get out of my head.

Friedkin Uncut (Francesco Zippel)

Okay, I’ll admit it. The Exorcist is one of my favorite films of all time. In the hands of another, it could have easily been a film filled with indecorous pretension and campy grandiosity, but instead, it took its time to descend into the malevolent depths of the human condition – and this is Bill Friedkin. He is a man who can simultaneously hold the recognition of the greatness of his work while also vehemently rejecting the notion that he’s “an artist.” In Friedkin Uncut, we are taken by the man himself to traverse through his entire filmography, and what a great ride it is.

This is not a ‘flashy’ documentary and it doesn’t set out to be. Director Francesco Zippel takes great care to present this autobiography in a tactful yet playful way, incorporating a great deal of talking heads from directors like Tarantino, Argento, and many others. The film’s focus on the work of its subject and desire to learn more from it is what really makes it worth watching. Come for the exorcisms, stay for the jokes.

In the Aisles (Thomas Stuber)

In the Aisles begins promisingly – forklifts glide around a large, wholesale supermarket as Johann Strauss’ “The Blue Danube” plays overhead. This whimsical opening, along with a few other moments in the film, pleasantly reminded me of Jacques Tati‘s Playtime, where you are the spectator to the humor in the mundane. While charm abounds, these promising moments are spaced sparsely throughout the film’s weighty runtime and ultimately left me wanting more (and less) from this well-intentioned drama.

We watch as shy and reclusive Christian, played by Transit actor Franz Rogowski, begins his new job at the aforementioned supermarket and strikes up a mild-tempered romance with sweets section employee, Marion (Sandra Hüller). Their flirtation is sweet, and Christian’s rather unlikely sex appeal is bound to draw many in, but the scenes between them are few and desperately far between. Director Thomas Stuber’s In the Aisles takes this familiar place and makes it new by lifting the retail veil to reveal the relationships and forklift drama that transpires therein, but for every three seconds of film, perhaps there should have been one.

Father the Flame (Chad Terpstra)

I hope to find someone who looks at me like Lee Erek looks at briar wood. He is a master craftsman whose love for the tobacco pipe is as sincere as it is infectious, and as an avid cigar smoker myself, his appreciation for its physical form and all it represents made complete sense to me. Father the Flame falls into a documentary category I’m never not drawn to, where people’s obsessive love for a person, place, or thing is at the center (think Chicken People or Christopher Guest’s Best in Show).

Much like its doc/mockumentary counterparts, there is something delightfully absurd about Father the Flame. Vivid, close-up images of wood grain and burning embers play to the audience’s senses while classical music blasts in the background. The film has both style and substance, but the style does begin to overpower the latter. While there are structural and stylistic aspects of this film that feel a bit formulaic, its stunning imagery and charismatic characters carry it beyond its cinematic doppelgängers. In the end, you really could superimpose anything over the image of the pipe. Perhaps for you it’s vintage cars, cake decorating, or chicken competitions, but whatever the obsession, the human desire to appreciate the complex and nuanced aspects of life is as intrinsic to who we are as anything.

Mario (Marcel Gisler)

Within the fandom-filled world of soccer comes this affectionate and heartfelt German drama about love, identity, and the sacrifices we make to behold them. Mario follows its two main characters, Mario and Leon (Max Hubacher and Aaron Altaras), as they navigate the homophobic backdrop to their soccer league which insists upon keeping them apart.

If not for the brilliant acting on the part of both Hubacher and Altaras, this film might easily fall into the category of ‘yet another film about a closeted gay relationship,’ but thankfully, it avoids it. The tender romance at the center of the film is driven in large part by Hubacher, who shows a great deal of emotional brevity from start to finish. And no, he doesn’t have a mustache or wear a red hat. That’s a whole different thing.

United Skates (Dyana Winkler & Tina Brown)

In a time fraught with strife, there is an American tradition that has served as respite for those who partake in its dazzling exhibition, and it might just be making a comeback. Roller skating. Much in the same expository vein as Paris is Burning and The Area, first-time directors Dyana Winkler and Tina Brown take us into the mesmerizing underground scene of roller rinks and introduce us to those who reside there in United Skates.

This is a film that paints a humanizing portrait of an endangered form of expression, risked at the hands of the micro-racism and economic tribulations faced by the African-American community. We see that at their worst, roller rinks act as a microcosm to the racial divide in our country, and at their best, bear witness to the harmony we long for.

Which of these films will you be keeping your eye out for upon its release?