Reeling: The Chicago Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival, the second-oldest gay-themed film festival in the United States, will be celebrating its 25th anniversary in November.
Reeling will open with what one publication has labeled "another significant milestone" in gay film history. That's Phillip J. Bartell's Eating Out Two: Sloppy Seconds, supposed to be the first ever sequel to a gay-themed flick. The film revolves around a gay man (Jim Verraros) pretending to be straight so he can get the guy of his dreams — something that may make sense to someone, somewhere.
Significant milestones aside, the festival's film line-up does include a number of intriguing titles, among them Ramón Salazar's 20 centímetros / 20 Centimeters, a musical starring Mónica Cervera (the hilarious sex-crazed psychopath in Perfect Crime / Crimen ferpecto) as a narcoleptic transvestite who wants to become a woman; Jean-
Marc Vallée's multiple-award winner C.R.A.Z.Y., about a young gay man (Marc-André Grondin) growing up in the Montreal of the 1960s and 1970s; and Ahmed Imamovic's controversial Go West, the love tale of two Bosnians — one Serb, one Muslim, both male.
According to the festival's website, the program offers "something for everyone," including documentaries "on subjects ranging from transgendered women (MtF) in prison to a Christian summer camp for queer teens."
Reeling runs from Nov. 2-11.