Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
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Chicago will host its first-ever “Cinema Weekend” celebrating independent and local film and the art house venues that screen such movies, organizers announced Monday.
The Chicago Film Office and chicagoscreens.org will host the inaugural Chicago Cinema Weekend from March 19-21. It will feature special programming, giveaways and screenings of films, from independent new releases to “Chicago-made classics.”
Some movies will be presented for free. Participating venues include the Music Box Theatre, the Gene Siskel Film Center, Facets Film Forum and the Claudia Cassidy Theater at the Chicago Cultural Center.
Popular pictures from the film festival season will also be presented by the Chicago International Film Festival, Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival, and the One Earth Film Festival.
Bucking a trend of declining audiences, independent film venues are drawing larger crowds following the COVID-19 pandemic. A 2025 survey by the Art House Convergence nonprofit found that 25% of respondents began attending an independent cinema in the past three years.
A similar trend has been reported locally, according to the Chicago Alliance of Film Festivals, which operates chicagoscreens.org. The group’s venue members, which include Music Box Theatre, Gene Siskel Film Center and Facets Film Forum, have reported a growth in tickets sold, ranging from 45% to 95%, from 2023 to 2025.
Chicago Cinema Weekend aims to establish the city as a model for collaborative independent film programming.
“The Chicago audience has been growing like wildfire,” said Karen Cardarelli, the event’s executive producer and former executive director of Facets Film Forum. “They want a community experience. They want a cultural hub.”
Local film venues have also responded by opening pop-up bars and lounges, and offering relevant programming.
“Coming out of COVID, none of us had film tris.”
Chicago Cinema Weekend will also show retrospectives, which have become more popular since the pandemic, Cardarelli said.
“It was those people who saw them by themselves on their laptop, and now they want to see it with a community,” she said.
More participants will be added to the event over the coming months, and further details about programming will be announced early next year.
Across the arts scene, nonprofits are grappling with cuts to federal and corporate arts funding. Audience-building events like this one can counteract those revenue losses.
“This idea that 50 to 60% of your budget is from contributed revenue is maybe an outdated idea, and so growing audiences can help to solve that,” Cardarelli said.
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Erica Thompson
Chicago Sun-TimesArts and culture reporter
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