21st Chicago Underground Film Festival

21st Chicago Underground Film Festival

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Come out for the 21st Annual Chicago Underground Film Festival. Five days of experimental, independent and documentary films from around the world. With a focus on the artistic, aesthetic and fun side of independent filmmaking, the festival promotes radical works that break new ground in form, content and technique, films that challenge, entertain and provoke.

Highlights of the 21st Edition include: Opening Night
The midwest premiere of What I Love About Concrete , A homespun high school fairy tale comedy shot in Memphis, Tennessee with a shoestring budget and a grand vision by first time co-directors Katherine Dohan and Alanna Stewart. A Million Miles Away , fresh from the Tiger Awards Short Film competition at this year’s Rotterdam International Film Festival, CUFF presents the US premiere of Jennifer Reeder’s latest film. An adult woman on the edge of failing and a pack of teenage girls simultaneously experience a supernatural version of coming-of-age.

On Closing Night
Festival alumnus Usama Alshaibi’s newest documentary American Arab. The director’s first film made under auspices of Chicago’s Kartemquin Films (Hoop dreams, The Interrupters) is a candid and provocative look at contradictions of Arab identity in post 9/11 America sparking a frank conversation about identity and perception.

Over a hundred new feature-length and short underground films will screen.
For complete schedule information visitwww.cuff.org
For the past two decades, the Chicago Underground Film Festival has provided audiences with an accessible, viewer-friendly showcase for Avant-Garde and cult cinema, and established itself as the premier venue for emerging independent filmmakers. From alternative music documentary and political agitprop to high camp and formal experimentation, CUFF likes films that go beyond expectations and genre — films made with passion, obsession and drive. Earlier this year the readers of Moviemaker Magazine named CUFF one of “the coolest film festivals in the world.”