While traveling for film festivals is always a pleasure and a privilege, there is nothing like enjoying the comfort of one’s own city. This is what makes the Chicago International Film Festival so special; For almost two weeks, the city’s artists, creators and moviegoers gather to watch a variety of films from around the world. Watching festivals is his way of cultivating a culture. I found familyIt’s exciting to see a familiar place innovated as people make new connections and the city fully embraces its film roots. Accordingly, three dramas performed as part of this year’s CIFF deconstruct the safety and security that home provides, showing how fragile the rhythms we regulate are and how the relationship between where we are and where we come from is always changing and re-forming. was discussed.

Director Nnamdi Asomugha’s first film starts at the 82nd minute “Knife” is a masterclass in suspense and tragedy that refuses to give viewers easy answers even as it gives viewers a family to empathize with and root for. In addition to directing the film himself and co-writing the script with Mark Duplass, Asomugha plays Chris, the head of a black family who investigates a mysterious noise in his home late in the evening. Daughters Kendra (Amari Alexis Price) and Ryley (Aiden Gabrielle Price) and her husband Alex (Aja Naomi King) are asleep. He grabs a pocket knife and walks into his kitchen and sees an old white woman standing there. Asomugha doesn’t show what happens next, only its devastating consequences: the woman’s body on the ground, Chris’s knife not far from her right hand. Alex, Ryley and Kendra arrive at the scene and Chris perhaps calls an ambulance ahead of time. When police officers arrive to greet the family instead, Chris and Alex quickly realize the situation could put their family at further risk. Understandably, in an attempt to appear more sympathetic to people who prefer to be arrested first and ask questions later, Alex slightly alters the presentation of the situation, causing a chain reaction of tension and anxiety as the family tries to make it out of the police interrogation unscathed.

The lack of coherent or loud music often creates the feeling that what we are witnessing is a documentary unfolding in real time. Asomugha and cinematographer Alejandro Mejía love faces; their cameras focus on the tortured and calculating faces of family and officers responding in real time to what is happening. The movie is ultimately about how a family unravels. Asomugha does a great job of making it feel like an inherently terrible cascade of disaster that is inevitable despite the fact that we can make “better choices.” In fact, the film asks how disenfranchised people should live in light of a police state where one wrong word or misread body language can mean the difference between life and death. There’s an extremely relatable scene where Chris’s prescription bottles are stared at for too long by police officers, as if to imply that they might not be legal or prescription.

Melissa Leo also excels as a detective tasked with uncovering “what really happened.” But it’s clear that the officers aren’t trying to find the truth there so much as find a story that will fit their own preconceived notions and narratives, and Leo strikes a razor-sharp balance in dragging him into corruption. bias evident to viewers while superficially above reproach; he is someone who is under the illusion that he is really there to help. Asomugha also refuses to characterize his characters in an archetypal fashion, especially when portraying Chris. Chris has flaws, but the film is about whether people like him are allowed to have flaws under America’s criminal justice system, and whether those flaws deserve the treatment he ultimately receives.

It was filmed over 15 days in northern Illinois but in an unspecified town. “Ok” It is a dark subversion of the “Prodigal Son” story and will certainly make insightful and enlightening viewing for those who feel they have gone beyond the scope and needs of their hometown and community. The film focuses on famous writer Louie (Scott Michael Foster) who returns home to collect his late father’s belongings. He plans to stay just a few days but is quickly drawn back into the orbit of his childhood friends and flames, particularly Travis (Kevin Bigley) and Lainey (Kate Cobb, who also serves as director). This is a sobering and ultimately terrifying story about how our relationship with home changes as we move around the world, and how chasing success causes us to wound and forget those who love and care about us most.

From the beginning, Cobb masterfully demonstrates that Louie’s return will be nothing short of a warm homecoming. Louie’s literary success is based on his stories based on people from his hometown, and he often uses their real names and life stories. Although the exact nature of these stories is not discussed, it is clear that he took a lot of creative freedom when writing about his community and was not afraid to twist the truth to make it more exciting and profitable.

Cobb has created a universally relatable setting here, even as he tells a very specific story about Louie. No matter how far we go from home, there’s always that feeling that we can’t help but fall back into old habits when we return. Additionally, it also shows that when we leave, the people we leave behind are often frozen in time; Weirdness happens when we try to connect because we’re trying to reconcile who they are now with who we’ve known them before. As Louie goes through the motions of his old life and catches up with the people in his town, he wonders if the only thing that seems to bind him together are the people he used to know.

Cobb’s direction injects a disturbing sense of anxiety and frustration into everything that happens; People are nice enough, but their subtleties reveal a deeper frustration and dissatisfaction with how they are portrayed. Foster is also a revelation here; he never strays too far from reminding viewers that he is obsessive and insensitive, but also deeply relatable. It’s funny to witness how her “society” politeness clashes with the warmth and friendliness of those back home, especially in the moments when she tries to reconnect with Travis; He thinks he’s being nice, but this becomes even more shocking and further underlines his isolation and separation from these people he used to know. Indeed, real life is often much more complex, nuanced and less exciting than the movies or books we read, and the film becomes a critique of how we can easily ignore our past and criticize it for the sake of profit. The film raises important questions about how we should manage the stories of those who are not ours.

I must fully admit that in light of Israel’s ongoing displacement and destruction of Palestine and its people, watching (and reviewing) Israeli director Shemi Zarhin’s “Bliss” makes it difficult to sympathize with and watch. Because the film was written and shot before October 7, it does not comment directly on the current violence. However, the film features locations that are no longer the same, such as a community center with a swimming pool. destroyed due to conflict. Even though the film itself is a drama and romance, witnessing it with that in mind still feels uncomfortable because visually it already feels out of date and disconnected from what’s going on right now; There is a jarring dissonance between the compassion and struggle it attempts to portray in light of the violence currently taking place in these regions.

“Happiness” It explores how to find moments of happiness in the midst of familial disruption. His characters often put family members’ commitment to unconditional love to the test and impressively reflect how people in the family play different roles towards each other as life progresses. The film follows Sassi (Sasson Gabay) and Effi (Asi Levi), a married couple who work various part-time jobs to qualify. They rarely get a moment’s relief as Sassi’s son racks up excessive gambling debts, and they help him pay them off. Despite their daily grind, they find much humor and joy in their circumstances, even finding the bright side of Effi’s sexual impotence. This fragile (but exhausting) peace is tested when two young men make a noisy return to their lives: Sassi’s boisterous and free-spirited grandson Omri (Maor Levi), who returns to live with Sassi and Effi, and David (Adi Alon) Effi’ A former student of his, with whom he had an affair, comes to him for hydrotherapy.

As Sassi and Effi now try to create a new normal, the film touches on how much disruption is the norm when living our lives and that we must learn to embrace life’s unexpected wrinkles. Refreshingly, it portrays Sassi and Effi as people with full and rich lives; As much as I love coming-of-age movies, there’s often a dulling and cinematic disinterest in those past a certain age. Sassi and Effi are honest about how they handle their doubts, disappointments, and desires, and the arrival of Omri and David becomes a gateway for them to reflect on their regrets and life choices. Zarhin’s power comes from how he frames these everyday moments; Her determination to see Sassi and Effi’s everyday lives underscores Sassi and Effi’s central theme of finding respect in the ordinary. In a scene where Sassi helps Omri with hydrotherapy, Zarhin’s camera steps back to frame the two of them as very small compared to the size of the pool they are in; It feels like nothing more than baptism.