Summertime moviegoing, especially in a big city with a healthy appetite for both cinephilia and nostalgia, means more than simply waiting around for franchise blockbusters to take your money and run.
Here in Chicago we’re happily lousy with options. Several film series tied to summer viewing take place under the stars; others unfold indoors, in brick-and-mortar auditoriums filled by various programmers and presenters devoted to the full international range of film history.
Here’s my suggestion: Start with these 10. If you don’t like the sound of these titles, scan others included on the same far-flung rosters, from Ravinia to Millennium Park, from Navy Pier to Gallagher Way outside Wrigley Field. The outdoor series are picnic-friendly and guaranteed, for better or worse, to keep you awash in the unwashed masses, otherwise known as humanity. The indoor offerings complement the season by giving you ways and means of escape, through the viewpoint of someone else’s daydreams.
My Chicago 10:
“Chimes at Midnight,” 7 and 9:30 p.m. June 1; 1:30 p.m. June 3, Doc Films, Ida Noyes Hall, University of Chicago. Orson Welles’ great, chaotic, touching 1966 Shakespearean foray, a compression of the “Henry” plays, featuring Welles as Sir John Falstaff. A nice, wintry antidote to the typical Midwestern June. Website: docfilms.uchicago.edu.
“Hairspray,” 6:30 p.m. June 5, Millennium Park Summer Film Series, Jay Pritzker Pavilion. The 1988 John Waters happy-feet fairy tale, set in early ’60s Baltimore, stars Ricki Lake, Divine and Debbie Harry, and launches the free Pritzker Pavilion series. Opening night co-presented by Chicago Underground Film Festival. Website: millenniumpark.org.
“Nossa Chape” (2018), June 15-21, Facets Cinematheque. Here’s a break from the usual summertime sports movie offerings: a documentary, rapturously received on the festival circuit, about a Brazilian soccer tragedy and its unexpectedly inspiring aftermath. Website: facets.org.
“Rio Bravo” (1959), 7 p.m. June 18, Chicago Film Society at Music Box Theatre. Howard Hawks’ sublimely off-the-cuff response to the perceived dirty-red socialist tendencies of “High Noon” stars John Wayne, Dean Martin, Angie Dickinson and Ricky Nelson. Bring your dad, if he’s that kind of dad.
“Liquid Sky” (1982), June 19-July 5, Gene Siskel Film Center. Be they human or alien, everyone’s trying to score something in this seminal downtown punk fantasia, restored to optimum glitter-and-skeeze for a new century. Website: siskelfilmcenter.org.
“The Fisher King” (1991), July 17 (time TBA), Music Box Theatre. As part of its retrospective of work featuring the late Robin Williams, the Music Box screens director Terry Gilliam’s wild odd-couple comedy-drama starring Jeff Bridges as a soul-blasted shock jock and Williams as a homeless medieval scholar (the usual kind). Website: musicboxtheatre.com.
“Selena,” 7 p.m. July 23, Navy Pier, Lake Stage, Polk Bros Park. Jennifer Lopez becomes a star before your eyes in Gregory Nava’s biopic, full of feeling and summery-hot rhythms. Free; the Water Flicks series is co-sponsored by the Chicago International Film Festival. Website: navypier.org/free-outdoor-movie-series-water-flicks.
“The Wild Party” (1929), 7:30 p.m. Aug. 1, Chicago Film Society at Northeastern Illinois University. An early sound picture, full of fraught sexual dynamics, this unique time capsule stars “It” girl Clara Bow as the ha-cha queen of Winston College for Women. The cast, including Frederic March as the professor for whom Bow gets all hotsy-totsy, was directed by pioneering female director Dorothy Arzner. Website: chicagofilmsociety.org.
“Vertigo” (1958), 8 p.m. Aug. 15, Ravinia Festival. The Bernard Herrmann musical score merits co-lead status in Alfred Hitchcock’s haunting treatise on romantic obsession, alongside James Stewart and Kim Novak. The Ravinia screening boasts a live performance of the Herrmann score played by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra; the program’s introduced by Chicago Tribune film critic Michael Phillips, and isn’t he a pip? Website: ravinia.org.
“Space Jam” (1996), 7:30 p.m. Aug. 22, Gallagher Way, outside Wrigley Field. The Music Box presents a new season of largely sports-related cinematic jams this summer, including the one about the time Bugs Bunny and Bill Murray recruited Michael Jordan to win an intergalactically important Big Game. Free. Website: musicboxtheatre.com.
Michael Phillips is a Tribune critic.
mjphillips@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @phillipstribune.com
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