At 92 years old, legendary documentarian Frederick Wiseman (Titicut Follies) has made only a couple fiction films. His latest is one of those rare instances yet again, a collaboration with Nathalie Boutefeu who co-wrote and stars in this adaptation of letters and diary entries from Leo and Sophia Tolstoy.

Dialogue with Filmmaker Frederick Wiseman (virtual)

Loosely inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’ short story The Aleph, Iva Radivojević’s Aleph is an exploration of Borges’ obsession with the infinite. Hybridizing interviews and scripted content with local actors and performers spanning from Greece to Nepal, we witness the ways in which our actions, however small, have vast, unforeseeable consequences, forcing the audience to reckon with their own significance in the grand design of human experience.

This modern immigrant story is a re-imagining of a traditional medieval legend in which a Ghanaian couple goes to Europe to find a better life only to land in a refugee camp in Serbia. When Strahinja's wife, Ababuo, goes missing, he must go on an epic journey to get her back, risking his safety and freedom in an inhospitable and unwelcoming land.

In loving tribute to the late master filmmaker, we present one of his many adaptations. Band of Outsiders was adapted from the novel Fool's Gold by Dolores Hitchens. Franz (Sami Frey) and Arthur (Claude Brasseur) don’t have money, jobs, or prospects, but they do have a black convertible and a shared romantic interest in Odile (Anna Karina). When Odile lets slip that a stash of cash is ineptly hidden in the isolated villa where she lives, the men hatch a plan to take it for themselves.

An ex-Foreign Legion officer recalls his once glorious life leading troops in Djibouti.

Iowa City based artist Tracie Morris remixes and reimagines the narrative of the 2018 blockbuster film through a live, experimental, multi-voiced reading accompanying a visual-only screening of the film.

Dialogue with Artist Tracie Morris and cast

Adapted by Iowa Writers Workshop alum David Kajganich from the novel of the same name by Camille DeAngelis, this unconventional tale of first love follows Maren (Taylor Russell), a young woman learning how to survive on the margins of society, and Lee (Timothée Chalamet), an intense and disenfranchised drifter. The two misfits venture across the midwest, searching for identity and chasing beauty in a perilous world that cannot abide who they are — cannibals.

Dialogue with Producer / screenwriter David Kajganich and novelist Camille DeAngelis

Using footage, form, and structure from big budget action blockbusters of the past four decades to create a climate disaster film that is just as bombastic and ridiculous as the films it's sourced from while also speaking to our current climate crisis is no small task. But the Anti-banality Union have managed to do just that complete with an all-star cast.

Dialogue with Filmmaker from the Anti-banality Union

The #1 podcast for the movie buff according to the New York Times, Chicago’s Filmspotting has been going strong since 2005. In this conversation, Adam and Sam share their picks for some of the best recent films adapted from fiction, plays, musicals, and more.

Dialogue with hosts Adam Kempenaar, Sam Van Hallgren

An adaptation of a modern cult classic (One Cut of the Dead) that itself was an adaptation of a play from the Academy Award winning director of The Artist, this bloody zom-com stays true to its predecessor, even casting one of the the actors from the original film in one of many meta shoutouts.

After discovering the 1950s case files of a trans woman forced to choose between honesty and access to care, a trans director and cast interpret archival transcripts as talk show in a meta examination of the power, privilege, and perils of visibility.

Dialogue with the Filmmaker (virtual)

This cerebral drama follows Clarisse who has left her husband and children without explanation. In almost a dream-like haze, details begin to emerge as we cut back and forth between this portrait of a woman in crisis and the family she has left behind.

Two billion years ahead of us, a future race of humans finds itself on the verge of extinction. Almost all that is left in the world are lone and surreal monuments, beaming their message into the wilderness.

Adapted from the Hebrew language novel of the same name by Palestinian author Sayed Kashua, this gently comedic drama deals with charged issues of class and identity from the director of The Band's Visit as a bussinessman gets stuck in the Arabic village where he grew up when it is put under lockdown by Israeli soldiers without explanation.

An immersive journey through the New York music scene of the early 2000s. A new generation kick-started a musical rebirth for New York City that reverberated around the world.

Dialogue with Author Lizzy Goodman

An open-hearted, unrelentingly energetic orphan struggles to make the best of his life on the streets of Milan.

An audio-driven VR experience that reveals and dramatizes the fundamental injustice of a world held hostage by nuclear weapons. Open to the public throughout the festival, reservations suggested, beginning October 6.

Dialogue with Advocate from Games for Change

Inspired by Bernard Cendron and Gérard Chenu's 1974 biography Onoda, seul en guerre dans la jungle and the life of Hiroo Onoda, the film follows a 22-year-old Japanese soldier as he retreats into the jungles after World War II has ended only to continue the fight for 10,000 days.

Adapted from the novel of the same title by Virginia Woolf and presented in a stunning 4K restoration, Sally Potter’s Orlando recounts 400 years in the life of a shapeshifting poet who assumes the guise of multiple genders.

Peter Von Kant, a successful, famous director, lives with his assistant Karl, whom he likes to mistreat and humiliate. Through the great actress Sidonie, he meets and falls in love with Amir, a handsome young man of modest means.

Director Alain Gomis recontextualizes the footage of Monk's time in Paris, before his evening concert, to give us a raw and intimate look at an artist who is in the grip of the violent factory of stereotypes from which he is trying to escape.

Set in rural California and Mexico’s Pacific coast, this documentary is a portrait of the unlikely friendship of two Mexican migrants, told within the frame of the dramatic clash between systemic forces and personal choices that envelop young, incarcerated men of color in America.

Dialogue with Director Rodrigo Reyes

See this special screening before its official U.S. premiere! Kids bring your parents for this brand new animated film featuring a beloved storybook character come to life.

Subject explores the life-altering experience of sharing one’s life on screen profiling the participants of five acclaimed documentaries. The filmmakers allow the film’s collaborators to have the last word, contextualizing their own participation in the project. As tens of millions of people consume documentaries in an unprecedented, “golden era,” the film urges audiences to consider the impact on documentary participants.

Using footage from hundreds of films over decades of film history, this ghost story, of sorts, brings together an ensemble cast of actors with one thing in common: each is no longer alive. There exists only a single 35mm print of the film that is touring around the world and is meant to deteriorate with each projection.

Dialogue with Director Charlie Shackleton (virtual)