Author Archive | Kasey Martin

The Chicago International Film Festival is very excited to welcome the director and star of The Road Not Taken, Gaopeng Tang and Qi Xiaojing. The film’s protagonist is a bumbling ostrich farmer, indebted to the local mob. He agrees to take care of a sullen kidnapped boy until his father pays his ransom. The odd pair impulsively hits the road, and antics abound as they link up with other transient souls who inhabit the expansive plains of China’s Gobi Desert.[…]

The Chicago International Film Festival is very excited to welcome the director of Facing the Wind, Meritxell Colell Aparicio. The film begins when choreographer Mónica returns to the small Spanish village where she was born to visit her father on his deathbed. Arriving too late, she is left to help her grieving mother sell the family home and to confront her own feelings of loss and remorse. Movement and dance give powerful emotion to newcomer Aparicio’s elegant drama about coming to terms with the past and pressing on.[…]

Unfortunately, Duelles director Olivier Masset-Depasse will no longer be attending the screenings of his film at this year’s Chicago International Film Festival, including today’s screening, Monday, October 15 at 8:30pm.[…]

The Chicago International Film Festival is very excited to welcome the writer, producer, and lead actress of Olympia, McKenzie Chinn. Featuring quirky animation and a revelatory central performance, Olympia is a heartfelt story for anyone who’s ever felt adrift on the rough seas of adulthood. Director Gregory Dixon, producer Sarah Sharp, and actor Charles Andrew Gardner are also scheduled to attend.

Olympia

Chicago Tribune reporter Nina Metz interviewed Chinn about her writing process, the need for strong black female leads in film, and discussed the influence Chicago had on the filmmaking.[…]