Chicago Critics Film Festival 2025 Preview

If you were at the 2024 Chicago Critics Film Festival, you could have seen the first Windy City screenings of “Sing Sing,” “Thelma,” “In a Violent Nature,” “Babes,” “Ghostlight,” “Good One,” “I Saw the TV Glow,” and so many more. This festival, which I co-produce, has one of the strongest recent track records of giving ticket buyers their first chance to see their favorite films of the year. Past premieres have included “Past Lives,” “The Farewell,” “Eighth Grade,” “First Reformed,” “The Spectacular Now,” “Stories We Tell,” and dozens more. This is the place to be starting Friday, and through the next week at the Music Box Theatre. Find the schedule and breakdown of all of our films below with links and quotes from our coverage of each from film festivals around the world when available.

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FRIDAY, MAY 2^nd

7pm “The Baltimorons” (with director Jay Duplass and stars Michael Strassner & Liz Larsen)

Duplass and Strassner have crafted a beautiful film that somehow feels spontaneous, a window into a relationship that wouldn’t have happened without a missed step. I’m big on what Paul Auster called “The Music of Chance,” a sense that life would be totally different if not for one random event, and “The Baltimorons” hums with that energy. But it’s not just twists of fate that make Cliff and Didi so memorable: It’s their bone-deep decency. These are good people trying to make it through a tough world, and they see each other in a way that no one else has in years. It’s an incredibly funny, genuinely moving character study that’s not explicitly “about” anything but these two lovely people. Yet, I walked away from it telling myself to “Yes, And” more of my own life. – Brian Tallerico

9:45pm “Lurker”

“Lurker” isn’t solely about Matthew’s fixation on Oliver; it’s also Oliver’s vain wish to be the biggest pop star in the world. And like Matthew, Oliver will stop at nothing—even if it means degrading himself to accomplish his goal. In that sense, Russell’s film is also about Hollywood, and not in an inside baseball way. It’s a vicious cycle of doing anything to get the shot, to catch the essence, to craft a mythology around the image. The ones who succeed are willing to drop any pretense of morality of being a moth baking by a star. “Lurker” isn’t a cautionary tale. It’s a slick, eerie, and deliciously messy guide to relevance.  – Robert Daniels

11:59pm “Best Wishes to All”

SATURDAY, MAY 3^rd

11:30am “Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight”

Davidtz herself plays Nicola Fuller, a ball of constant tension who sleeps with a gun by her side because she’s so certain that the country is about to explode into violence. Davidtz the director handles this aspect of her film well, giving the whole thing a natural simmering tension, like a calm before a storm. We’ve seen lots of films about political upheaval and rebellion, but those things don’t happen overnight. – Brian Tallerico

1:45pm “Shorts Program 1” (w/special guests)

4:15pm “Brother Verses Brother” (w/director-writer-stars Ari & Ethan Gold)

“Brother Verses Brother” is about those nights we all have when everything seems a little heightened, when we argue a little more vehemently and love a little stronger, when memories of our childhood fuel visions of our future. It’s a sweet, smart movie that’s not only unlike anything I saw at SXSW this year, but anything I’ll see anywhere all year. – Brian Tallerico

6:30pm “Twinless” (w/director-star James Sweeney & star Dylan O’Brien)

Most of “Twinless” operates as a clever dark comedy, relying on finely tuned set-up to punchline structuring to provide levity. O’Brien plays Roman as a dim-witted Mark Wahlberg figure who often barely knows what “irreconcilable” means. The way he also plays Roman’s guilt for not understanding Rocky, for becoming estranged from his twin when Rocky moved away from their Idaho home to Portland, where much of the film takes place, is devastating. – Robert Daniels

9pm “Strange Days” (30^th anniversary on 35mm)

What stays from the movie are not the transient plot problems, however, but the overall impact. This is the first movie about virtual reality to deal in a challenging way with the implications of the technology. It’s fascinating the way Bigelow is able to suggest so much of VR’s impact (and dangers) within a movie – a form of VR that’s a century old. As the character Faith observes: “One of the ways movies are still better than playback – the music comes up, and you know it’s over.” – Roger Ebert

11:59pm “Mr. K.”

Perhaps the weirdest film I’ve seen this year, “Mr. K” is an audacious and existential class commentary from writer-director Tallulah H. Schwab. Its aesthetic and narrative eccentricities become a tender nesting ground for its themes on the drudgery of pointless work and the need for the community to brave life’s horrors. – Zachary Lee

SUNDAY, MAY 4^th

11:30am “The Great Dictator” (85^th anniversary on 35mm)

The film itself is filled with sad, pathetic little jokes; this is Chaplin’s most serious, most tragic, most human work. He did not find Hitler at all funny, needless to say, and so although he uses his own comic genius to inspire the movie, the comedy is never neutral. It is jugular, as he creates a Hynkel who is a vain, strutting buffoon, given to egomaniacal rages and ridiculous posturing. Charlie never for a moment allows us to laugh with Hynkel, but only at him, and Hynkel thus becomes the only totally unsympathetic character Chaplin has ever played. To balance him, Chaplin also plays the part of a Jewish barber who happens to be Hynkel’s exact double (and who also happens to look exactly like the Little Tramp). – Roger Ebert

2:15pm “Shorts Program 2”

4:30pm “Friendship”

Robinson plays the truly awkward Craig Waterman, who we meet in a meeting in which his wife (a cleverly sly Kate Mara) reveals that she doesn’t orgasm with her husband. Craig is one of those guys who can have an ordinary encounter for only about 90 seconds before saying or doing something awkward, a guy who’s generally looked down on by even his partner and son. When he meets the charming Austin Carmichael (Rudd), he falls for someone so much more interesting than himself, basically becoming obsessed with holding onto a suburban friendship that goes sideways almost immediately. – Brian Tallerico

7pm “It Ends” (w/director-writer Alex Ullom)

Of course, the brilliant concept of “It Ends” is a metaphor for young people about to head out on the unending road of adult life, but writer/director Alexander Ullom never hammers his themes or overexplains his concept. How each of the four passengers responds to the impossible situation says a lot about their characters with someone like Tyler resigned to his fate while James tries to figure out what’s going on and how to solve it. Are they in purgatory? Day and Fisher try to make the most of it, stopping to scream and even dance when they can. – Brian Tallerico

9:30pm “40 Acres”

Deadwyler plays Hailey, the matriarch of a family on a remote farm after the end of the world. This is a post-apocalyptic world of man’s making—no zombies or alien invasions to speak of—and Hailey’s clan is introduced as a well-oiled machine when it comes to protecting their land and resources. Casting Hailey’s partner Galen with the great Michael Greyeyes gives Thorne’s film a fascinating undercurrent of racial tension in that it becomes about a Black and Indigenous family fighting for land and survival from largely white invaders who want to not just take what’s rightfully theirs but possibly even use their bodies for sustenance. – Brian Tallerico

MONDAY, MAY 5^th

4:30pm “Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted”

7pm “Sorry, Baby” (w/director-writer-star Eva Victor)

This dramedy is a breathtaking tonal tightrope, a movie that blends hysterical comedy with deep trauma to present something that feels most of all true. It’s an announcement of a major talent in Victor, who wrote, directed, and stars in a film that had people gasping for air after its perfect conclusion. I don’t usually comment on audience response at Sundance because it can be a little exaggerated but the group behind me literally just kept saying variations on “That was SO good” through the entire credits, as if they were too speechless to say anything else. They weren’t wrong. – Brian Tallerico

9:45pm “Sister Midnight”

TUESDAY, MAY 6^th

4:30pm “April”

This is a testament to the power of Dea Kulumbegashvili’s artistry. In only her second feature, the Georgian writer-director has crafted a film filled with images that will sear into your mind, even as they challenge your patience. She favors long, static takes that may frustrate you, even as you admire their beauty or the boldness of their framing. While it may be difficult to discern what Kulumbegashvili’s aim is in the moment, the cumulative effect of her storytelling approach packs an undeniable wallop. – Christy Lemire

7:15pm “Fantasy Life” (w/director-writer-star Matthew Shear)

Everyone here is good to great, and the professionalism in the ensemble helps the script over some shallow patches, but it’s truly Peet’s film, leaning into a sort of metatextual aspect of her career. Peet has worked consistently in TV but hasn’t had a film role since 2015—so there’s added gravity when Dianne speaks of not acting in a decade and thinking that she’s aged out of Hollywood. Peet gets vulnerable in ways we haven’t really seen before, and while “Fantasy Life” is entertaining on its own terms the most exciting thing about it is fantasizing about the comeback roles it could lead to in Peet’s career. – Brian Tallerico

9:45pm “Obex”

“Obex” is the kind of powerfully subconscious film that works on you after you’ve finished watching it, flooding back to your mind when you hear cicadas, while you stare at a blank television, or simply standing in line at the grocery store. It’s an effect that is often akin to Massive Attack’s “Teardrop;” it “shakes me, makes me lighter.”  – Robert Daniels

WEDNESDAY, MAY 7^th

4:30pm “Happyend”

He proves to have an incredibly confident eye, shooting his young performers in Tokyo against a backdrop of concrete roads and buildings in a manner that’s both mesmerizing and slightly terrifying. This generation has grown up in a world of increased monitoring, and Sora’s script deftly charts two people heading in different directions under that oppressive system, one toward obedience and the other toward rebellion. – Brian Tallerico

7pm “Familiar Touch” (w/director Sarah Friedland & star Kathleen Chalfant)

Sarah Friedland’s “Familiar Touch” opens with a tender, heartbreaking scene: the great H. Jon Benjamin (Bob Belcher and Sterling Archer, among about a hundred other voices) takes his mother Ruth (Kathleen Chalfant) to an assisted living facility for her increasingly dangerous dementia. Ruth doesn’t even realize he’s her son; she thinks they’re going on a date together. When she’s told the truth, you can see the heartbreaking confusion in Chalfant’s eyes. – Brian Tallerico

9:30pm “Zodiac Killer Project”

This isn’t a true crime documentary as much as a dissection of the entire genre. As someone who has covered true crime docuseries for years (and watches even more than I write about), Shackleton’s project hit home in so many ways. It’s a smart breakdown of how these series function, a reminder of their strengths and weaknesses. It’s not another Zodiac series as much it is as a dissection of how these series work. It’s like pulling back the curtain on the true crime Wizard of Oz. You won’t quite look at another one the same way. – Brian Tallerico

THURSDAY, MAY 8^th

5pm “Desert Road”

A very different kind of loop unfolds in Shannon Triplett’s very good “Desert Road,” a film that it truly feels that Rod Serling would have dug. “The Twilight Zone” regularly returned to travelers who break from reality, and that’s the basic template of Triplett’s film, a movie that consistently challenges perception of what’s really going on. Even at its conclusion, I’m not 100% it all adds up, but that’s fine for a film that’s more interested in how we move on than checking all the narrative boxes. Most of all, this is just a well-made mindf*ck of a movie, and a wonderful showcase for Kristine Froseth, who gives one of the best performances of SXSW 2024. – Brian Tallerico

7:15pm “A Little Prayer” (w/writer-director Angus MacLachlan & star Jane Levy)

The truth is that, especially when you hear it’s from the writer of “Junebug,” Angus MacLachlan’s “A Little Prayer” has a relatively predictable path to follow. However, that doesn’t stop it from having an impact. There’s a reason we watch well-done family dramedies like this one over and over again. We see ourselves or the people we know in them. And if we believe the emotion of these characters, the familiarity of it all doesn’t matter. “A Little Prayer” is an old-fashioned family drama, a movie that cares about its people more than any high concept, and one that wants you to get to know them in a way that makes you care for them. One of the most moving films you’ll see this year, it’s also a fantastic platform for the phenomenal Jane Levy and the legendary David Strathairn, a performer who seems incapable of delivering a false performance. – Brian Tallerico