Chicago’s International Film Festival, born back in the volatile autumn of 1964 and now celebrating its 35th anniversary season, is the oldest competitive North American cinema fest and the model for many that followed.
So why can’t it get respect? Why do critics point instead to other film festivals in other cities (Toronto, Montreal, Sundance) as prime examples?
It’s a troubling question, but with two simple answers. The first deals with misperceptions. The second, as with much else, is a matter of money.
I’m a film festival loyalist myself, and the festivals are some of the great perks of the job.
Whether you’re in Cannes or Montreal, Venice or Sundance, it’s a magnificent mix of vacation-style excitement and intensive work: seeing dozens of movies in a week or two, hobnobbing with other critics, mingling constantly with filmmakers and stars. (Is it really work to interview Julie Delpy, Jacqueline Bisset or Robin Williams?)
I’ve just returned from Toronto, and in recent years I’ve been to Cannes, Montreal, Sundance, Los Angeles and New York.
I’ve enjoyed them all. But, for most Chicagoans, the only major world fest they can attend is Chicago’s own, which rolls around again Wednesday for its 35th anniversary edition. Once more, founder/artistic director Michael Kutza and his staff will unreel a bounty of films, about 112 features from 29 countries, with highlights that include personal appearances by Gregory Peck, Morgan Freeman, director John Frankenheimer (with “Seconds”) and special-effects wizard Ray Harryhausen. Lauren Bacall appeared at the annual gala held Sept. 25, and film showings will include “The Cider House Rules,” “L’Humanite,” Manoel De Oliveira’s “The Letter,” “Snow Falling on Cedars” and the opening night movie, “Mansfield Park.”
And once again, the festival and its admirers face the persistent questions. Why isn’t Chicago’s film fest the equal, in scope and prestige, of Toronto’s or Montreal’s?
It should be. It could be.
With its packed yearly schedule and diversity, Chicago was an original model for Montreal and Toronto. And it’s an event that has brought thousands of excellent films and hundreds of top world filmmakers to this city. By any standard, it’s a major annual cultural event and, in a better, more rational world, executive director Judy Gaynor, artistic director Kutza and their overworked staff, who regularly perform miracles with severely limited resources, would get applause instead of carps.
So why don’t Chicago’s government and corporations give our festival more than a tiny fraction of the support given Montreal and Toronto, which are subsidized to the tune of millions of dollars? Why don’t they support film to even the degree they support other arts organizations and festivals in the city?
More than likely, I expect, the Chicago International Film Festival doesn’t get support because of some myths about film festivals, foreign language movies and the arts in general.
Myth No. 1: Foreign language films are boring, tedious exercises intended for a minority audience of snobs and elitists, as opposed to the “regular” guys and gals who go to “real movies” (Hollywood studio fare).
The Reality: Audiences for foreign language and festival films — and alternative movies in general — differ from average crowds not because of larger incomes or elitism but because they tend to be more passionate about film. Movie buffs come from all classes and backgrounds — and many (including me) are fans of Hollywood crowd-pleasers just as much as esoteric imports. By contrast, the smuggest and most elitist moviegoers are often the ones who attend only the biggest, most popular movies and ridicule anything else. Real down-to-earth moviegoers are more tolerant and open-minded.
Myth No. 2: Government should never support the arts, which are a frill activity, unimportant to society and its main concern, a booming economy. Art of any kind should be just as subject to the market and its laws as any other business.
The reality: This is a fantasy largely propagated by people who wouldn’t know art even if Da Vinci’s “Last Supper” fell on their heads.
In fact, the world owes some of its greatest painting, music and art to subsidies from state and church taxes. And public support for film festivals has reaped vast rewards in cities enlightened enough to sponsor them. Besides cultural enrichment, the film fests in Montreal and Toronto attract hundreds of world celebrities to those cities and generate millions of dollars of local revenue in tourism and film production. That highly tangible financial benefit, and not artistic altruism, is one of the main reasons governments sink millions of dollars into those film festivals.
Myth No. 3: The Chicago Film Festival is so messed up that it doesn’t deserve city or private support. Why not just hop a plane and go to New York, Los Angeles, Sundance?
The reality: I don’t want to rehash the fest’s recent stormy history, except to note that, as current board chairman Daniel Coffey points out, it’s a chapter nearly over, stemming from a feud between Kutza and some of his old board members and a more than $500,000 debt that, in the last four years, has been nearly retired. Corporate contributions have risen every year since.
Despite more widespread myths, the festivals in New York (too small) and Los Angeles (now in transition) aren’t as good as ours. As for Sundance, it’s too cold and snowy, and there aren’t enough seats left in the theaters to fit us all in.
Coffey doesn’t hold any illusions that Chicago — or any city in the U.S. — will ever get behind a film festival the way Montreal or Toronto has. We won’t be that lucky. But he does say that restitution of the old $55,000 hotel-motel tax grant from the city (during the Jane Byrne and Michael Bilandic administrations) would make an enormous difference. And, even more important, much of the city would benefit from the realization of the festival’s longstanding plan for a permanent home, perhaps somewhere in the new Randolph Street area theater district. A multiplex arrangement could then be available year-round to many of the other city film festivals as well.
Let me indulge in a sermon. Art, like religion or crusades for justice, is one of the great crucial healing activities that binds us all together. Similarly, international film festivals like Chicago’s — which display, criticize and celebrate the cultures and experiences of people around the world — can be great gathering places for an entire urban community and all its people, especially a city as culturally rich and ethnically diverse as Chicago.
That’s why I think it’s time for the city and its citizens to think seriously about guaranteeing the future of their often overlooked, neglected and maligned cultural treasure; to make sure it survives, thrives and grows into the festival it could be — with just a little vision and a little help.
Meanwhile, let’s wish the Chicago Film Fest a happy 35th (and don’t miss “Mansfield Park,” Gregory Peck, “L’Humanite” or “Seconds”).
