Chicago's Film Festival Turns 62: 'Club Kid' Opens a 12-Day Run of 170 Films, a First-Ever Physical Media Fair, and a Closing Night With Tony Gilroy

The short version: The Chicago International Film Festival — the longest-running competitive film festival in North America — opened its 62nd edition on Wednesday, October 14, and runs through October 25. The program holds more than 110 feature films and 57 shorts from around 60 countries, four world premieres, and a footprint that now stretches across eight Chicago venues, from the festival hub at AMC NEWCITY to the Harold Washington Library.

Opening night: a debut, on film

The festival chose a first-timer to open. 'Club Kid,' the debut feature from writer-director Jordan Firstman, who also stars, is a comedy-drama about a club promoter whose carefully weightless life is upended by the arrival of a 10-year-old son he never knew he had. The film arrived as a Cannes sensation, and the festival paired its Chicago premiere — screened on 35mm at the Music Box Theatre — with its Breakthrough Award for Firstman. Demand told its own story: there was no standby admission for opening night, though an encore screening follows Saturday, October 17 with open captions. The late-night slot on opening day went to the period horror-comedy 'Victorian Psycho,' and local reviewers walking out of day one were already treating the pairing as a mission statement — a star-driven premiere up front, a stranger discovery in the dark, which is what this festival has balanced for six decades.

The center: Chicago filmmakers, a Chicago chef

The edition's Centerpiece is 'Mouse,' from Chicago-based filmmakers Kelly O'Sullivan and Alex Thompson, with Sophie Okonedo receiving the festival's Spotlight Award at the screening. The local thread runs deeper than the marquee slot. The City & State program includes the world premiere of 'Ever After,' a documentary following Michelin-starred Chicago chef Curtis Duffy, who is appearing at screenings in person. Acting honors are spread across the twelve days: Carrie Coon and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor are among this year's honorees, and as part of the thirtieth anniversary of the festival's Black Perspectives program, Marlon Wayans receives a Career Achievement Award and sits for a conversation with Omar Epps, with filmmaker Cheryl Dunye also honored. Bob Odenkirk and Tim Blake Nelson are among the guests scheduled to appear in person — the kind of working-actor presence that suits a festival which has always programmed for the city around it, not just the industry passing through.

Premier counts and the world in twelve days

The arithmetic of the program: more than 110 features and 57 shorts, cinema from roughly 60 countries, four world premieres, 15 North American premieres and 21 U.S. premieres. Cannes titles anchor the international side, including James Gray's 'Paper Tiger' and Pawel Pawlikowski's 'Fatherland,' which arrives carrying a Best Director prize earned at the festival's own competition. Artistic Director Mimi Plauche, in interviews ahead of opening, framed this year's campaign — 'Cinema in Real Life' — around the simple claim that audiences feel these films more in a room together than alone at home, and the schedule is built to defend it: juries and visiting filmmakers, panels at venues including the University of Illinois Chicago, and Dutch cinema showcases at the Chicago History Museum and the Gene Siskel Film Center among the dozens of side programs threaded through the screenings.

A fair for people who still own VHS tapes

The edition's most Chicago idea may be its smallest room. On October 17 and 18 the festival hosts its first Physical Media Fair, inviting collectors to bring LaserDiscs, VHS tapes, DVDs, Blu-rays and 4K discs to swap, with a temporary shop from distributors and local stores alongside. It is a shrewd piece of programming for 2026: physical media has become the badge of the serious film household again, and a festival whose audience skews toward people who still shelve movies is speaking directly to its own. Between the fair, the eight-venue spread — NEWCITY, Music Box, Siskel, the Logan Center, Chicago History Museum, Kennedy-King College, the National Museum of Mexican Art and the library — and ticket prices that keep general screenings within reach, the festival continues to behave less like a velvet-rope market and more like a civic event, which is the real reason it has outlasted its rivals.

Closing night and what to catch

The festival closes October 25 with 'Behemoth!,' a drama from Tony Gilroy starring Pedro Pascal, Olivia Wilde, Eva Victor and Will Arnett, with composer Michael Abels scheduled to attend. Between now and then, the practical advice from programmers and local critics converges: anchor on the Centerpiece and the Cannes arrivals, leave open slots for the City & State discoveries, and treat the encore screenings — often with captions, often with the filmmakers still in town — as first-class choices rather than leftovers. Sixty-two editions in, the Chicago International Film Festival is not trying to be Cannes or Toronto. It is trying to be the twelve days when Chicago watches the world together, in the dark, on purpose — and on the evidence of an opening night with no standby seats left, the city is still showing up for exactly that.