Watch “Festival Faves” Under the Stars at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn Series
FACETS will be presenting “Festival Faves” at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn, an exclusive outdoor screening series featuring some of our new & retro favorites from the film festival circuit. Get your tickets here.
With the 2021 Cannes Film Festival having just wrapped up in France, film once again took center stage in the mainstream media coverage. Although that baton has now been passed over to the Olympics, we were collectively reminded just how and why these celebrations of film are so important.
Marking its 74th anniversary, the Cannes Film Festival has thrived in 2021’s information-driven, often dizzyingly fast-paced world. But how? Simply put, film festivals have an amazing ability to reinvent and reimagine the art form of cinema through the celebration of great introduction of new artists and films. Like FACETS and our local community here in Chicago, film festivals bring global film lovers together to celebrate the new and, in some cases, the underrated. Film festivals bathe the new in glittering colors: a celebration, an event—and in times of restrictions, lockdowns and bleak statistics–a much-needed getaway. They give us a reason to drop our hesitancy. They serve as a trustworthy voucher for the reinventors and those who reimagine.
Most importantly, Film festivals give a voice to the new and are one of the few mainstream events to rejoice independent creators. Binding the well-established to the not yet known, film festivals keep their relevancy through showcasing the old and the reinventions of the upcoming all at once. Film festivals carefully maintained relevancy as a result of their offering original perspectives a stage, not only link the indie to the mainstream they reunite the global film community: fostering community engagement while honoring diversity and inclusion.
Get your tickets now to celebrate the best film festivals have to offer for FACETS “Festival Faves” screenings at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn series, presented in partnership with The Davis Theater, Sterling Bay & the 2nd Ward. Screenings take place in the heart of Lincoln Yards at 1665 N Ada Street, Chicago.
My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To
Colombian-American Jonathan Cuartas’ debut film My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell it To similarly highlights a social issue through a historical and reinventive lens. Combination horror film and family drama our main protagonists are three siblings: the younger brother, Thomas, needs to consume human blood to live, the older, Dwight, serves as the hunter, murderer, and blood supplier, and sister, Jessie, takes on the role of mediator. But as tensions rise the cracks in this family’s foundation begin to show themselves while begging the question of what it means to be a family in the first place.
Between Thomas’ yearning for friends his own age, Dwight’s inner turmoil surrounding the sacrifices he makes to keep his younger brother alive, and Jessie’s struggle to keep the family together living the way they’ve always lived, Cuartas’ debut film tests whether the water of the womb is thicker than the blood of the covenant—and Dwight’s victims.
Partnering up with his brother (cinematographer) and father (for production design), Cuartas informed the New York Times that the inspiration for this film was his grandmother’s death—having died in hospice, the film presents a strong allegory for addictions and their tolls on families. While reflecting current issues such as addiction My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To finds itself examining a question as old as humanity: what does it mean to be a family? What does it mean to make sacrifices that hurt you for the ones that you love?
This psychological thriller aims to reimagine the vampire genre by focusing less on the outer fears of death and instead focuses on the internal fears and struggles. Or as one fan on Twitter put it: “the carnage wrought by the ties that bind.” As people become more self-aware of toxic and harmful relationships, Cuartas’ unique voice reminds us that relationships are often not so black-and-white as the labels we use to describe them.
Watch My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To Thursday, August 19, 2021, at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn.
Serial Mom
Directed by John Waters
Like such labels, looks can often also be deceiving. John Walters’ Serial Mom explores just that: suburban housewife, Beverly, is determined to make sure her family has a picture-perfect appearance–even if it means murdering practically half the town to do so. The entirety of the plot revolves around Beverly’s various murders, each connected to a passing comment or action that somehow made Beverly’s family look anything other than ideal.
While Waters is better known for his early transgressive films like Pink Flamingos (1972) and Female Trouble (1974), or his more mainstream work like the 80’s classic Hairspray (1988), this Cannes Film Festival closing film combines the best of Waters’ twisted worlds into one underrated, camp classic. Showcasing the irony of suburban hypocrisies has been a longtime favorite of Waters’ filmography, and with Serial Mom, he once again brings mid-century U.S.A. to the screen in perfectly over-the-top satirical fashion.
Although Waters’ early work might not have always been considered traditional film festival fare, over the years festivals like TIFF, Tribeca, and yes, even Cannes, have begun to celebrate directors like him who never worry about pandering to an audience. This allows for the freedom needed to produce such creative tales and gives a spotlight to such cult-classics that otherwise would not have garnered as much attention.
Watch Serial Mom Thursday, September 2, 2021, at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn.
Bottle Rocket
While the Cannes Film Festival is known globally for its promotion of new artists into the film industry, an equally contributory film festival is the Sundance Film Festival. That is why the final film we will be showing is an alternative Festival Fave, the one that got away from the 1996 Sundance Film Festival, Bottle Rocket.
Although Bottle Rocket was ultimately rejected from the 1996 festival, it still helped launch iconic director Wes Anderson’s career, again giving a voice to new artists keeping the film community evolving. Based on Anderson’s 1994 Sundance Film Festival short (that was selected), Bottle Rocket is part coming-of-age and part gangster film centering around two brothers (played by real-life brothers Luke and Owen Wilson) who rob a bookstore with their friend Bob and the crazy antics that follow.
Taking their cues from the real world, one of the final heist scenes was based on the Wilson’s brothers own attempt to fool the cops into thinking their apartment had been robbed (in order to get their cheap landlord to fix a window). Neither plan panned out (in real life or in the film), and the film seemingly also took a fall as it was screened out of competition. However, the positive reviews that critics left for Bottle Rocket were enough to give Anderson the confidence he needed to take on his later films and Bottle Rocket rose to success in its own right.
While in this instance the Sundance Film Festival failed to—and later regretted not being able to—give Anderson the platform he needed, the right viewers propelled him forward regardless. People are hesitant towards the new and unknown, finding those few people that can encourage original voices is so crucial for not only filmmakers but consumers as well and the larger film community. This was later reflected on by festival director John Cooper, when he discussed his regrets about rejecting Bottle Rocket.
Watch Bottle Rocket Thursday, September 16, 2021, at Lincoln Yards’ Movies on the Lawn.
Film festivals maintain their nearly century-long relevancy through their ability and success in offering original perspectives a stage, a voice and most importantly: an audience. Not only does this facilitate the coverage of indie creators in mainstream media but it reunites the global film community by fostering community engagement while honoring diversity and inclusion.
Through all this film festivals help keep the film industry alive, prosperous and ever-changing pulling new audience members, creators and critics in while connecting them to veterans of the film community. To celebrate these landmarks of culture is why we here at FACETS are presenting our Festival Faves at Lincoln Yard’s Movies on the Lawn series.
Celebrate the power of film festivals with the Tribeca Film Festival’s 2021 selection My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To, the 1994 Cannes Film Festival closing film Serial Mom, and the “one that got away” from the Sundance Film Festival in 1996, Bottle Rocket. Browse the entire schedule here.
Author: Kelly Kayed is an Editorial Assistant Intern at FACETS. She received her B.A. in Asian Studies from Bowling Green State University after completing her thesis on employment opportunities for single mothers in Japan. Having lived in a variety of places from bustling Los Angeles to small town Bowling Green, Ohio, and even Japan, her writing is a cumulation of the various environments lived in, perspectives traded and people she’s met along the way.