Synopsis

Lucas is a teenager in limbo. He and his family have recently started over in a gray, industrial city, where he works aimlessly flipping burgers at a restaurant that never ceases to exploit him. He spends his afternoons with his coworker and friend Oscar, a socially awkward free spirit who resists the family and work pressures to which Lucas feels so beholden. When Oscar suddenly departs on a distant journey, entrusting Lucas with a shoebox full of his memories and most valued possessions, these objects will send Lucas on a path of discovery and connection. Through poetry and photography, he seeks to capture the light he observes amongst the darkness, and bring it back home.

José Pablo Escamilla’s formally daring second feature is a poetic odyssey, searching for meaning in grief and genuine human connection through the act of creating.

Synopsis

In 2019, Rotterdam’s famed Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen shuttered for renovations, making way for a radical new shimmering art mecca just down the street. Called the Depot, this ambitious construction — composed of walls of curved mirrored glass — was a shared dream of architect Winy Maas and irreverent museum director Sjarel Ex. It reimagines art exhibition as a gigantic, glorified storage unit, with all of its treasures on view for everyone to see.

With a playful approach that even includes musical numbers, ChicagoIFF alumnus Sonia Herman Dolz (The Master and His Pupil, Yo soy así) tracks these two ambitious and passionate visionaries as they work together to break down the old museum, construct the new one, and delicately transport precious masterpieces into their new home. A captivating portrait of both institutions from the inside out, Depot is a glorious ode to both art and architecture.

A pandel discussion will follow the October 12th screening.

Synopsis

Angela, a production assistant working for an anonymous multinational corporation, is tasked with driving around Bucharest filming casting interviews for a promotional video about workplace safety. As she goes door to door collecting employees’ personal experiences of getting injured on the job, a pattern of malfeasance begins to emerge. When a half-paralyzed worker suggests that the company is responsible for his accident, Angela bears witness to a dizzying, hilarious series of corporate backflips.

True to form, in Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World director Radu Jude (Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn) presents a whirlwind examination of modern existence with a wry, absurdist touch. Observed with a keen understanding of our cacophonous digital world, the film breathlessly satirizes the capitalistic machinery of everyday life while celebrating the boisterous humanity contained therein.

Synopsis

Spring 2020. A Texas family gathers for a reunion on their sprawling estate. When it’s time to memorialize the proceedings with a family photo, it becomes Katy’s job to wrangle everyone down by the river. Then her mother disappears, and Katy’s unwelcome task morphs into a frantic search as a trickle of news about COVID-19 spreads through the get-together. Fear begins to grip Katy, and reality appears to be tearing at the seams.

Ruminating on life, death, the nature of photography, and existence itself, the film is a brilliantly observed, often slyly humorous picture of the unwieldy chaos of a family gathering and a potent distillation of early pandemic paranoia.

Synopsis

When Vera was young, she gave her infant son up for adoption. Years later, she begins a seemingly futile search to find him. When Cora was young, she adopted a young boy, Egoz, after she was told she could not have children of her own. Now the two women’s lives, each a mirror of the other, unite as Egoz is about to turn 18 and their paths finally cross.

A road trip crossing northern Spain, a caper heist, and the discovery of a new family merge into a striking and stylized contemporary noir. Foremost by Night is a masterfully choreographed and ever-surprising examination of the nature of motherhood, and the threads that connect those who search for each other across time and space.