The 61st Chicago International Film Festival will open Oct. 15 with the world premiere of Kevin Shaw’s documentary “One Golden Summer,” revisiting the rise and fall of the city’s Jackie Robinson West Little League baseball team. The 12-day event, billed as North America’s longest-running competitive film festival, runs through Oct. 26 across multiple venues and will present 111 features and 70 shorts from more than 60 countries, including four world premieres, 17 North American bows and 18 U.S. debuts.
Opening Night’s After Dark program will screen “Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Rez Arc,” Tatsuya Yoshihara’s big-screen installment of the anime franchise. On Oct. 21, the Centerpiece slot goes to “Rental Family,” starring Brendan Fraser as an American actor struggling to find footing in modern-day Tokyo who takes a job with a Japanese agency that rents out family stand-ins. Director Hikari (“37 Seconds,” “Beef”) will receive the festival’s Spotlight Award that evening.
Closing Night will screen David Freyne’s “Eternity.” The film stars Elizabeth Olsen as Joan, who must choose between her husband, played by Miles Teller, and her first love, played by Callum Turner. Da’Vine Joy Randolph appears as the Afterlife Coordinator, in a world where souls have one week to decide where to spend eternity.
The Special Presentations section includes Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Bugonia,” Guillermo del Toro’s “Frankenstein,” both of which bowed in Venice competition, along with Jafar Panahi’s Cannes Palme d’Or winner “It Was Just an Accident.” Other entries include Bradley Cooper’s “Is This Thing On?,” starring Will Arnett and Laura Dern; Noah Baumbach’s “Jay Kelly,” toplined by George Clooney and Adam Sandler; and Rian Johnson’s third Knives Out mystery, “Wake Up Dead Man.”
Spotlight Presentations include Radu Jude’s “Dracula, his second film at the festival following “Kontinental ’25,” which screens in competition. Other entries include Mary Bronstein’s “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”; Sergei Loznitsa’s “Two Prosecutors,” and Isabel Coixet’s “Three Goodbyes.” Additional Spotlight titles are Gianfranco Rosi’s “Below the Clouds,” Kelly Reichardt’s “The Mastermind,” Bi Gan’s “Resurrection,” Annemarie Jacir’s “Palestine 36,” Christian Petzold’s “Miroirs No. 3,” Agnieszka Holland’s “Franz,” Lav Diaz’s “Magellan,” László Nemes’s “Orphan” and Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s “Young Mothers.”
Tribute programs will honor filmmaker Nia DaCosta, who receives an Artistic Achievement Award alongside the U.S. premiere of her latest feature, “Hedda.” Director Euzhan Palcy will be presented the Black Perspectives Tribute and Career Achievement Award. Joel Edgerton takes home the Artistic Achievement Award in Acting at the premiere of Clint Bentley’s “Train Dreams,” while Bentley himself is recognized for directing. Reichardt will also be in attendance for a retrospective capped by her new feature “The Mastermind.”
The festival’s Snapshots section, showcasing the diversity of contemporary global cinema, includes “This Island” from Lorraine Jones Molina and Cristian Carretero; “Pasa Faho” from Nigerian-Australian filmmaker Kalu Oji; Taiwan’s Oscar submission “Left-Handed Girl” by Shih-Ching Tsou; and “The President’s Cake” from Hasan Hadi. Additional titles include French animator Ugo Bienvenu’s “Arco” and Charlie Polinger’s “The Plague.”
A “Frame by Frame” program features 35mm presentations of five titles, including Bentley’s “Train Dreams,” Nemes’s “Orphan,” Richard Linklater’s “Nouvelle Vague” paired with a screening of Godard’s “Breathless,” and Reichardt’s “Old Joy.”
The Festival's competitive program spans International Feature, International Documentary, New Directors, OutLook and Shorts categories. Chicago’s Gold Hugo winners have often translated into Oscar nominations, including “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” (2024), “Close” (2022), “Drive My Car” (2021) and “The Worst Person in the World” (2021).
The City & State program will spotlight Illinois talent with Shaw’s “One Golden Summer” joined by Rich Newey’s “Adult Children,” Alex Phillips’ “Anything That Moves,” James Choi’s “Before the Call,” Curtis Miller’s “A Brief History of Chasing Storms” and Nurzhamal Karamoldoeva’s “Only Heaven Knows.”
Ten shorts programs range from comedies to dramas, thrillers and family animation. Highlights include “Debaters,” pairing J. Smith-Cameron and Kenneth Lonergan in a story of high school strivers competing in a congressional debate tournament; “Nervous Energy,” centered on two ambitious would-be filmmakers; The “Non-Actor,” starring Victoria Pedretti and Maya Hawke, about a woman who travels to Los Angeles for hearing-loss treatment and ends up staying with her ex-boyfriend and his new partner; and “Lily,” a spooky school tale adapted by Stephen King from one of his earliest short stories.
Outré, a new shorts sidebar, showcases filmmakers who unabashedly follow their own singular visions into wildly new and weird territories. Selections include “Water Sports,” “Abortion Party,” and “Once in a Full Moon.”
Special events include the Criterion Mobile Closet, making its seventh U.S. stop outside the festival’s hub, and Industry Days, featuring Minding the Gap director Bing Liu in conversation, a documentary summit with Lisa Cortés and Michèle Stephenson, and sessions with execs from Shudder and Steven Yeun’s Celadon Pictures.
The Chicago International Film Festival runs October 15 – 26, 2025 with film screenings and programs presented at venues across the city including AMC NEWCITY 14, the Music Box Theatre, the Gene Siskel Film Center, the Chicago History Museum, the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago, as well as community screenings at pop-up locations including Kennedy-King College and the National Museum of Mexican Art.