Best Director

CHICAGO – The Chicago International Film Festival (CIFF) is competitive, and the 56th edition presented its awards on October 23rd, 2020, as a live virtual and online event on the CIFF YouTube page. The winner of the Gold Hugo as Best International Film was “Sweat” (France), directed by Magnus von Horn.

CHICAGO – The Chicago International Film Festival was founded in 1965 by Michael Kutza, and is the longest running “competitive film festival” in North America. So with that in mind it’s time for the 56th festival to confer those awards.

CHICAGO – Let’s make this important! The 92nd Academy Awards are on Sunday, February 9th, 2020, and HC.com film/entertainment contributors Patrick McDonald, Michael “Spike” Walters and Jon Lennon Espino are ready to add their Swami-like powers to eight major categories, plus three wild cards. Let the predicting begin.

CHICAGO – The Chicago International Film Festival is competitive, and the 55th edition presented its awards on October 25th, 2019, at CHEZ venue in Chicago. The winner of the Gold Hugo as Best International Film was “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” (France), directed by Céline Sclamma.

CHICAGO – Time to fill out the Oscar prediction ballots! The 91st Academy Awards are on Sunday, February 24th, 2019, and HC film critics Patrick McDonald, Michael “Spike” Walters and Jon Lennon Espino are ready to add their prognosticating powers to eight major categories, plus three wild cards. Let the predicting begin.

CHICAGO – The Chicago International Film Festival is competitive, and the 54th edition presented its awards on October 19th, 2018, at the AMC River East Theatre in Chicago. The winner of the Gold Hugo as Best Film was “Happy as Lazzaro” (Italy/Switzerland/Germany/France), directed by Alice Rohrwacher.

WASHINGTON, DC – Chicago took home a bit of gold on August 26th, 2018, as local filmmaker Oriana Oppice was awarded Best Director for her short film “Leia’s Army” at the Global Impact Film Festival in Washington, D.C. The film, which is a fictional overview of the Woman’s March Movement through multiple generations, is a contemporary and multi-dimensional look at families in the age of Trump.

CHICAGO – Time to fill out the Oscar prediction ballots! The 90th Academy Awards are on Sunday, March 4th, 2018, and HC film critics Patrick McDonald, Michael “Spike” Walters and Jon Lennon Espino are ready to add their prognosticating powers to all the major categories, plus three wild cards. Let the predicting begin.

CHICAGO – When is comes to Academy Award predictions, HollywoodChicago.com is second to none. That’s right, nobody does it better, even the approximately 100 million other outlets predicting the Big Night awards. HC film critics Patrick McDonald, Michael “Spike” Walters and Jon Lennon Espino “correctly” predict the major categories.

CHICAGO – Okay kids, time to jump into the 2016 Oscar Pool. There are “predictors,” and then there is HollywoodChicago.com! That’s right, critic contributors Spike Walters and Patrick McDonald have the inside scoop to who will win on Oscar night, because they have a DeLorean time machine – in their dreams!