Synopsis

A retired director (Kwon Haehyo), now running a bookshop, is hastily hired to supervise a short play at a nearby university. He agrees at the behest of his niece (Kim Minhee), who is scrambling to replace the student director who was dismissed due to misconduct. Excited to reconnect, the two work with the student actors to write and stage a work of political theater that irks the school administrators.

Infused with a political edge, By the Stream finds great depth in simplicity. Using a spare plot, stripped down visual style, and a cast of his regular actors, director Hong Sangsoo (On the Beach at Night Alone, 2017) crafts a wistful meditation about regret, human connection, and the creative process.

Synopsis

Moroccan friends Soundouss and Jaâfar arrive at a luxury villa in the resort town of Cabo Negro to await Jaâfar’s American lover, who is meant to join them there. The days go by, but the American doesn’t appear or answer Jaâfar’s calls. Left on their own in this place of transience, the villa becomes their refuge — but only for so long. As the harsh cultural and financial realities of life outside the villa creep in, the two friends seek out fleeting moments of connection with the other misfits of Cabo Negro. Profoundly subtle and rich, celebrated author Abdellah Taïa’s feature debut is an enchanting, tender ode to kinship and generosity between those pushed to the margins of society.

Synopsis

Traversing all of his past films, master director and Festival mainstay Jia Zhang-Ke delivers an epic look at the romantic destiny of his perennial heroine, Qiaoqiao (played by his wife, Zhao Tao). Utilizing scenes from his past work as well as documentary footage collected over the decades, Jia invents bold new scenarios that track his muse over 21 years. In the process, he offers a survey of contemporary China that examines the emotional tumult of living through turbulent social change. An invigorating assemblage of material old and new, Caught By the Tides is a one-of-a-kind odyssey through a nation’s history and a legendary auteur’s work.

Past works shown by Jia Zhang-Ke at the Chicago International Film Festival include Unknown Pleasures (2002), Platform (2005), 24 City (2008), Mountains May Depart (2015), and Ash Is Purest White (2018).

Synopsis

Kiyoshi Kurosawa has a gift for finding the uncanny in any situation. His latest film, Cloud, sees the Japanese genre master returning to the techno-paranoia of his 2001 classic Pulse, but with a twist: Here, Kurosawa is exploring the horror of buying something online, only to find out that it’s a useless piece of plastic junk. Ryosuke Yoshii (Masaki Suda) makes his living peddling these knockoffs under the username “Ratel,” and is doing quite well for himself — that is, until an online community of embittered, unhappy customers uncover “Ratel’s” true identity and track him down IRL.

Cloud is an intriguingly bizarre entry into Kuroswa’s filmography, combining cosmic horror with an EC Comics-style morality tale and just a hint of Reservoir Dogs. An anti-capitalist action movie with a dark sense of humor and loads of bloody gunplay, it’s a warning to anyone who’s ever hidden behind the anonymity of the internet.

Synopsis

On a whim, single father Lucky decides to take his 11-year-old son Mason to experience an American rite of passage: his first baseball game. It seems simple enough. But Lucky, bereft after a recent personal tragedy and navigating his son’s Down syndrome on his own, encounters a series of obstacles that will test his patience and his confidence as the two set out across Atlanta.

Photographed in vivid black-and-white with echoes of neorealist landmarks like Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep and Vittorio de Sica’s The Bicycle Thief, David Fortune’s subtle and elegantly conceived feature debut is brimming with authenticity and heart. With A Thousand and One co-star Will Catlett delivering another magnetic and sympathetic portrayal of a strong, nurturing Black man, Color Book is an intimate and resonant portrait of the unique, tender relationship between father and son.