Write your Film
We asked the people who know movies best what they’re dying to see this season. By Madeline Wolfson
Winter watch list
Ah, winter, that time of year when the deluge of snow is matched only by the deluge of films vying for your attention at the multiplex (and for the attention of Oscar voters). This winter’s selections will make choosing particularly tough for
Portrait of an artist Exploring the life of Anton.
moviegoers—a new Star Wars, a new Tarantino, a new Iñárritu film (and many more). To help you plow through the offerings, we asked Chicago’s most knowledgeable film types what has them psyched for the coming months.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens tSTAFF PICK Zach Long, Music editor
Thirty years after the second Death Star was destroyed, a new group of heroes gets into conflict with the evil First Order in the new, long- anticipated Star Wars. “Disney’s first Star Wars sequel is seemingly engineered to tick off all of my fanboy demands,” says Zach Long. “George Lucas is out of the picture,
leaving genre director J.J. Abrams at the reins; Luke, Han and Leia return with a compelling new cast; and computer-generated creatures are dialed back in favor of old- fashioned practical effects. Factor in the presence of an adorable spherical droid, and The Force Awakens may be the post-original- trilogy Star Wars movie I’ve been looking for.” Opens Dec 18
own review at
timeout.com/ reviewchicago
Edited by
Madeline Wolfson
film.chi@
timeout.com @madelinewolfson
Almost There Gordon Quinn, Kartemquin Films
Chicago’s Kartemquin Films (Hoop Dreams) cofounder and documentary filmmaker Gordon Quinn knows his docs and says not to miss Almost There. Filmmakers Dan Rybicky and Aaron Wickenden meet their subject, elderly artist Peter Anton, at a street fair and discover his fascinating story. “[Anton has] chronicled his life
Jane Got a Gun
Jessica Hardy, Chicago Comedy Film Festival founder
A bloody, dramatic Natalie Portman–led Western might not be the usual pick of a self-confessed comedy lover, but Jessica Hardy is ready to saddle up for Jane Got a Gun. From the moment she saw the poster— Portman looking badass against a moody sky—she was in. “Here you’ve got a Western, and on the poster is this very strong and masculine woman,” Hardy says. “I have a film theory background, and when I saw this, I thought my professor and I would be jumping
in these 12 huge volumes of clippings,” explains Quinn. What begins as a documentary about the artist becomes a movie about a scandal in his past. Quinn himself is working on his own documentary, ’63 Boycott, which features footage he shot in October 1963 when 200,000 Chicagoans marched in protest of defacto school segregation. Limited release Dec 11
Joy Nathan Rabin, film writer
Nathan Rabin, of the AV Club, is looking forward to Joy, which tells the tale of Joy Mangano, the mom who invented the Miracle Mop. That
Joy to
Not so plain Portman taking aim as Jane in the new Western.
up and down.” The film hasn’t had an easy ride to theaters, with three lead actors, a director and a cinematographer dropping out, but to Hardy’s delight, Portman stayed the course. Opens in February
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TIMEOUT.COM/CHICAGO December 2015–February 2016
the world Lawrence as Mangano.
might sound dull,
but consider that it’s directed by auteur-at-his-peak David O. Russell. “[He] has had one of the most fascinating trajectories of any major recent filmmaker,” Rabin says of Russell (Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle). For Joy, he reteams with Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro. “It’s a good opportunity for a ’70s-style character study about the extraordinary life of a seemingly ordinary person,” Rabin says. While he acknowledges the mainstream success of the director’s recent films, he hopes to see the return of the Russell of Spanking the Monkey. Opens Dec 25
dull, that it’s directed by
Film
PHOTOGRAPHS: TOP LEFT: COURTESY GORDON QUINN; BOTTOM LEFT: COURTESY LIONFLY ENTERTAINMENT; BOTTOM RIGHT: CHARLIE SIMOKAITIS
TAINMENT;
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