Chicago International REEL Shorts Film Festival

This Year's fest features the best short films from throughout the world.  Comedies, action, drama, Horror, Demented, arts,  we are showing a little of everything!  

Schedule of Events

7pm and 9pm Shows

7:00pm The Friday Opening Show

Direct Action
13 minutes
United Kingdom
Director - Tor Kristoffersen

A teenage environmentalist leads a protest
against a coal mine, setting her on a collision course
with her father, the police and courts.

KAD (Korean Adoptee)
8 minutes
Director - Katharin Mraz
Chicago

KAD (Korean Adoptee) is a "day in the life" coming of age story about Kate Davison, a Korean Adoptee.

Unperforming
5 minutes
Massachusetts
Director - Cristian Trout

To get the attention of his crush, a gay man competes with a popular personality in his community. As an insidious swarm of marketing and peer pressure drives him to obsess over how he measures up, he struggles to escape thoughts of inadequacy.

Falling Down - The Jesus Lizard
4 minutes
Director - Bill Barminski
California

Animated music video for the band, The Jesus Lizard

A Guest In My Country
16 minutes
New York
Director - John Gray

An immigrant Ubër driver takes an upscale couple across town, and the drama that unfolds among them reveals truths they all would have preferred stayed hidden.

Love, Love, Oh Awful Love
9 minutes
Director - Craig Bass
Illinois

Tucked away behind closed curtains and locked doors, Nora fears that her ex-boyfriend haunts her every step. But, is there more to his obsession than teenage hormones and a twisted mind?

Eastern
7 minutes
France
Director - Victor Dalmont, Mathis Dorniol, Valentine Fripier, Margaux Huvé, Marion Machelard, Maëva Mina, Iannis Oillic, Paul Pillan, Solène Poirier

Commissioned by the Sioux Standing Bull, the famous mercenary Glitch Westwood arrives in Eastern to kill his target and get his reward. He quickly kills it, but discovers that all the people have the same face.

Boom Problems
2 minutes
Director - Jonathan Moeller

A film crew struggles to get through a day when their boom operator can't keep the microphone out of the shot.

Once More, Like Rain Man
15 minutes
California
Director - Sue Ann Pien

‘It’s up to you to make a future that has you in it…’ We follow Zoe (Martinez) and her dad, Gerry (Jones) in a ‘day in the life’ of an autistic actress running the gambit of stereotypes she has to deal with - and her dad’s battle in supporting her forging that path for herself - in a funny, frustrating, painful and sometimes triumphantly sarcastic kind of way.

Don Chingón
10 minutes
Director - Carlos Lerma
Chicago

After moving to the United States, a young Mexican immigrant is faced with a deadly challenge: no Mexican food.

9:00pm - The Friday Evening Show

The Trade
6 minutes
Canada
Director - David Kalinauskas

A fantasy football junkie becomes a victim of his obsession.

Locksmith
8 minutes
Director - Corey Benson Powers

Emma, a striving professional, has her morning routine interrupted when a slovenly locksmith arrives to fix her broken lock. She prepares for the day but soon realizes he has intentions other than repair.

For Sale
12 minutes
Korea
Director - yongseop lee

Hong Seok, who was chased by loan sharks due to the failure of the entertainment bar business. Hong Seok, who has been living on the streets in the freezing weather, accidentally finds a 500 won coin on the vending machine...

Hand Job
12 minutes
Chicago
Director - Davis Cameron Chu, Meezahn Senbetta

After an attempted suicide, a sentient hand must save its body from certain death.

O Algorithm
2 minutes
Director - David Busse

An Ode to our digital lives.

Old Days
14 minutes
Director - Morgan Bass

Burn-in
3 minutes
Director - Charles Dillon Ward

Burn-in is an experimental short about a request to be forgotten, the messy deletion of bodies from photo albums, the faint remains of digital ghosts from the late 2000s, the impossibility of invisibility, and the permanence of the internet.

Shellfish
6 minutes
France
Director - Justine AUBERT, Cassandra BOUTON, Grégoire CALLIES, Maud CHESNEAU, Anna DANTON, Loic GIRAULT, Gatien PEYRUDE, Justine RAUX

In a French rocky inlet, Bernard, a small and selfish hermit crab loses his shell. He will has to face dangers of the beach to find an other one. In the company of a weird little crab which helps protecting him, both will lives multiples adventures that will befriend them.

Dice 'n Steal
7 minutes
Chicago
Director - Jason Wolfmiller

A young man on the run from debt collectors must haggle with an unusual car dealer for a vehicle to aid his escape.

Full Throttle Paradise
15 minutes
New York
Director - Nick DeSimone

A dark farce that explores feminism, materialism, and fetishes. Pat Padula, a seemingly connected man in the neighborhood, expresses his love for the free-spirited Dottie in an atypical family therapy session. But why in a motorcycle garage? Dottie is a bluntly aggressive woman who takes Pat's need for aher as a threat to her independence. Meanwhile, the attractive young female counselor is having her own problems navigating in a man's world, which sets her on a collision course with Dottie.

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