Interview: Chicago International Film Festival After Dark w/Raul Benitez
The Chicago International Film Festival (CIFF) is back and ready to rock the Windy City from October 12 through October 23. With its triumphant annual return comes another year of After Dark programming featuring some singular genre offerings. To find out more about the festival and its multitude of great titles, we kept up our own annual tradition and sat down to chat with Raul Benitez.
Raul is the director of programming for the After Dark section of CIFF and was kind enough to let us know why folks in the area should be excited for this new crop of derangement, why SHIN ULTRAMAN is so heavily anticipated in Chicago, and the best way to program your own movie marathon at home.
Neon Splatter: What do you think you’ve brought from the last festival to this year’s After Dark?
Raul Benitez: The big difference between last year and this year was that last year there was a little bit bigger pool of films to pull from only because a lot of films were held over because of the pandemic and there were still more films available in October. Because Chicago International Film Festival is so late in the festival season I have to look for films that are still around in October that haven’t been released yet. But even though there’s a little bit more slim pickings than last year, there’s still some really strong stuff this year that’s still working the festival circuit. I think the program is pretty strong—last year’s was pretty strong too, but this year is pretty strong even with those caveats.
NS: How do you picture, or how would you define, the CIFF After Dark audience?
RB: I think the audience for the After Dark series, overall, tends to skew younger than the audiences for the main Chicago International Film Festival. [CIFF has] a very large membership, because not only do we do the festival every year but we also do yearlong programming. For After Dark, we definitely have younger audiences that are looking for something different, something unexpected. Of course, we still get older folks attending After Dark screenings and had some come last year. I did have some…interesting conversations with those people last year in regards to the picks I had for After Dark—a lot of the stuff we had wasn’t stuff they weren’t used to seeing at the festival in previous years.
NS: Like THE SADNESS and MAD GOD?
RB: Yeah. [Laughs] Stuff like THE SADNESS, people were not used to. But for me that’s kind of the stuff that there’s a large audience for in Chicago. It’s a town that has a very strong genre community who really come out for these films. And I know some of the titles we picked this year is stuff people will come out for—they’re specifically looking for, in some cases. And all of these films are things that nobody in Chicago has seen yet. So I’m excited to bring these out to an audience that has been waiting to watch them at our festival.
NS: I asked this last year but what do you think will be the most polarizing or most talked about film—the title that will get the most buzz at CIFF After Dark?
RB: A couple come to mind. I think ALL JACKED UP AND FULL OF WORMS is going to be a great screening. It’s their hometown screening so they’re going to have a big turnout and we have something really fun planned for the screening. The film is really, really messed up. And it uses a very iconic, known location here in the city so some people will recognize the location. It uses local talents. It has a weird plot where people are sniffing up worms to get high and it follows these two loser characters that kind of bond over these worms. I think that’s going to get people talking just because of how weird it is and the special effects are really amazing.
The other one that I think a lot of people will be talking about is our opening night film, SICK. We’ll see how that goes with a pandemic movie. And then I think a lot of people are going to be surprised by A WOUNDED FAWN—when I watched it, I was surprised by it. I’m pretty sure it’ll get pretty good chatter around it.
NS: When you put together these programs, in the past year and this year, how do you gauge if it was a good crop of selections? At the end, how do you know what worked well? Audience reaction, your own insight, ticket sales, or some combination?
RB: I think for me the gauge is always audience reaction. Last year, we had a lot of great audience reaction and audience interaction. To me that’s the best gauge. You know you did a good job as a programmer when there’s a lot of people hanging out in the lobby talking about the film afterwards. It’s better than people going to the movie and then just walking out after. Because if they’re still talking about it, then you know it made an impact and for me that’s the gauge for a really great program. I’m hoping it’s the same this year, and I think there’ll definitely be a lot of chatter with some of these titles afterwards and I’m genuinely looking forward to that.
NS: There’s obviously a wide variety of types of films that can fall under an “After Dark” banner that involve various genres like horror and more. For you, when putting together a program, is it important to you that certain subgenres are represented or just the matter of these are the ones that resonated with you and you think they’ll resonate with others. Like do you think to yourself “I need to make sure I have a slasher film, something animated, an avant-garde one”?
RB: I don’t really, when programming, I don’t really think I need more horror or this type of thing. I’m just choosing the best of what’s out there that I can get that will resonate with audiences. In the past, and certainly last year too, After Dark skewed more horror. And the same this year, but I’m showing SHIN ULTRAMAN which is definitely not a horror film but it fits under the genre umbrella. We’re also showing LEONOR WILL NEVER DIE which is not really horror, but instead pays tribute to Filipino action movies which also falls under that genre umbrella. And we’re pairing that with an actual Filipino action movie called THE ONE-ARMED EXECUTIONER—
NS: Oh cool! I love that movie.
RB: Yeah. We’re showing that on 35mm, paired with LEONOR WILL NEVER DIE. I’m looking for what will really resonate with audiences, whether it’s horror, sci-fi, fantasy, action. And After Dark leans more towards horror, but I’m trying to expand that as best I can.
NS: If you were to pitch someone in the Chicago area to come to CIFF After Dark, what would you say to them?
RB: What you’re going to see at After Dark are films that are probably not going to get a mainstream theatrical release. Most of these will end up being art house titles, some of them you may not be able to see until much later on. Some of them are very niche—like LEONOR WILL NEVER DIE or ALL JACKED UP AND FULL OF WORMS—and so won’t play in most places. A lot of these will only be able to be seen theatrically at the Chicago International Film Festival.
The only one that I think will get a large theatrical release is SICK. But most of these are art house and will not be showing up in multiplexes. Also it’s great to see these kinds of films with an audience.
I’m particularly excited to see SHIN ULTRAMAN with an audience. Because Ultraman has had a very strong presence here in Chicago, they used to show episodes here starting back in the ‘80s all the way up to today.
In fact, at our press conference about a week ago, people were only asking me about SHIN ULTRAMAN. There’s a lot of people very excited about Ultraman, even when I’m saying “hey, I have other movies, too.”
NS: “It’s not all Ultraman, guys.”
RB: Right? There’s also the After Dark shorts program, as well, called “Things Are Not What They Seem” and that has some pretty interesting shorts in there. Including a local-based filmmaker named Ethan Soo with his short film SWEPT UNDER, about a killer rug. That played at Fantastic Fest. Showing a short called GUTS, about a guy whose guts are outside his body and he’s working at an office. There’s GIRLS NIGHT IN, which is girls are having a night out and they get interrupted by a serial killer. THE DINNER AFTER, about a woman who visits her parents and some nightmare stuff comes out of their conversation.
There’s LA CEREMONIA, about an exorcism that goes wrong. And a great short called O, GLORY, from England, pretty amazing film and one of the earliest shorts I programmed because I knew it had to play CIFF. A short film called SUCKER about a giant, mind-controlling leech. And a Mexican short that’s been getting a lot of buzz on its festival run called UNHEIMLICH, which is a woman’s house turns into a maze full of creatures and nightmares. I’m really excited about the shorts because they’re great and also most people won’t be able to see them until much later on.
NS: It’s usually months or even years until they land on YouTube or Vimeo. If they are ever posted anywhere.
RB: Absolutely.
NS: Lastly, do you have any tips for people who are programming their own Halloween movie marathon—or maybe just some genre film marathon one night?
RB: Actually, that’s how I started programming! I used to do little movie marathons and invite a bunch of friends over to watch. The thing with those is that they are a little bit easier to program, because it’s likely that if you’re doing that, then your friends aren’t as into films as you are. And you know what they’ve seen/haven’t seen. So you’re able to show them stuff that they had never even thought of or seen. Like one year I showed THE BROOD because somehow no one in my friend group had seen THE BROOD. And it blew their minds away. So I think if you really want to mess with your friends, you show them the most fucked up things you can because it won’t be stuff they’ll ever look for or usually find. As somebody who’s doing a movie marathon at home for friends, you can really have fun showing stuff to your friends, knowing they have most likely never seen any of the films you’re going to show them.
The Chicago International Film Festival After Dark program runs from October 12 through October 23. You can find specific dates and showtimes by checking out CIFF’s schedule. You can also follow them on Twitter for the latest news and updates.