''Rendezvous in Chicago'' is a 2018 American

romantic comedy Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a sub-genre of comedy and Romance novel, romance fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount all obstacles. Ro ...

film written and directed by Michael Glover Smith. The film consists of three vignettes that examine

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

couples at different stages in their relationships. The film premiered at the 2018 Adirondack Film Festival in

Glens Falls, New York Glens Falls is a City (New York), city in Warren County, New York, Warren County, New York, United States and is the central city of the Glens Falls, New York metropolitan area, Glens Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 14,83 ...

where it won second place in Audience Choice voting. It is notable for containing a cameo by French actress Haydée Politoff (''

La Collectionneuse ''La Collectionneuse'' (''The Collector'') is a 1967 French comedy-drama film directed by Éric Rohmer. The fourth entry in his ''Six Moral Tales'' series, it is his first film in colour. Set on the south coast of France in August, it portrays the ...

''), her first screen appearance in 37 years.

Plot

''Rendezvous in Chicago'' is composed of three vignettes corresponding to the beginning, middle and end stages of a relationship: Paul, a charming young man, attempts to pick up Delaney, a bookish grad student, in an otherwise empty wine bar. Rob and Andy are enjoying the bliss of newly formed couplehood. Julie comes home from work early to find her boyfriend, Wyatt, in bed with another woman.

Background and production

According to an interview with

PBS Wisconsin PBS Wisconsin (formerly Wisconsin Public Television or WPT) is a network of non-commercial educational television stations operated primarily by the Wisconsin Educational Communications Board and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. It compri ...

, Smith said the first idea he had for the film was its climactic

fourth wall The fourth wall is a performance dramatic convention, convention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this "wall", the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. ...

-breaking moment: "Whenever I watch movies, I always feel like I'm falling in love with somebody on screen...At a certain point, I wondered, 'Why does the person onscreen never fall back in love with me?'...That sort of led naturally to the question, 'Well, if that were to happen, if the character onscreen were to start flirting with me as a viewer, what would that look like? How could that happen?'" The film was shot in eight days on a budget of $20,000.

Cast

* Clare Cooney as Delaney * Kevin Wehby as Paul * Rashaad Hall as Andy * Matthew Sherbach as Rob * Nina Ganet as Julie * Shane Simmons as Wyatt * Haydée Politoff as Dr. Scherer

Release

Among the film's theatrical screenings:

Spectacle Theater Spectacle Theater is a collectively run, independent movie theater that operates out of a small space in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in New York City, New York, United States. History Spectacle Theater opened in September 2010 at 124 S. 3rd Street ...

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

, the

Gene Siskel Film Center The Gene Siskel Film Center, formerly The Film Center of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and commonly referred to as The Film Center or The Gene Siskel, is the cinematheque attached to The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. It ...

, the Maple Theater in

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

, and more than a dozen film festival screenings across the United States including the

Buffalo International Film Festival The Buffalo International Film Festival was founded in 2006, and takes place in October of each year in Buffalo, New York. It is also known as the Buffalo Film Festival. History The film festival became a 501c3 not-for-profit charity in January 20 ...

, the

Beloit International Film Festival The Beloit International Film Festival (BIFF) is an annual film festival in Beloit, Wisconsin Beloit ( ) is a city in Rock County, Wisconsin, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 36,657 people. Beloit is a princi ...

, the

Santa Fe Film Festival The Santa Fe Film Festival is a non-profit organization which presents important world cinema that represents aesthetic, critical, and entertainment standards highlighting New Mexican film. The organization partners with educational groups, school ...

, the

George Lindsey George Smith Lindsey (December 17, 1928 – May 6, 2012) was an American actor and stand-up comedian, best known for his role as Goober Pyle on ''The Andy Griffith Show'', '' Mayberry R.F.D.'' and his subsequent tenure on '' Hee-Haw''. Life a ...

UNA Film Festival (where it won the award for Best Comedy) and the

Tallahassee Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of and the only incorporated municipality in Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In 2024, the est ...

Film Festival (where it won the Audience Favorite award for Best Feature).

Home Video

Questar Entertainment announced acquisition of streaming/ VOD rights to the film in November 2019.

Reception

''Rendezvous in Chicago'' has received very positive reviews for its writing, acting, and directing. This includes a three-and-a-half (out of four) star review by the ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspaper ...

'''

Richard Roeper Richard E. Roeper (born October 17, 1959) is an American writer. He is a former columnist and film critic for the '' Chicago Sun-Times'', where he wrote for 39 years dating back to 1986 until his departure in 2025. He co-hosted the television s ...

who called it "exhilaratingly entertaining", a ''Newcity Chicago'' review that compared it to the work of

Éric Rohmer Jean Marie Maurice Schérer or Maurice Henri Joseph Schérer, known as Éric Rohmer (; 21 March 192011 January 2010), was a French film director, film critic, journalist, novelist, screenwriter, and teacher. Rohmer was the last of the Post-war, p ...

and

Arnaud Desplechin Arnaud Desplechin (; born 31 October 1960) is a French film director and screenwriter. In 2016, he won the César Award for Best Director for ''My Golden Days'' (2015). He has also written and directed the films ''The Sentinel (1992 film), The Sen ...

, and a review in ''

Film Threat ''Film Threat'' is an American online film review publication, and earlier, a national magazine that focused primarily on independent film, although it also reviewed videos and DVDs of mainstream films, as well as Hollywood movies in theaters. ...

'' that cited Nina Ganet as giving the film's standout performance. As of May 2021,

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

shows an approval rating of 90%, based on ten reviews.

References

{{Reflist 2018 films 2018 comedy-drama films Films set in Chicago American comedy-drama films 2010s English-language films 2010s American films English-language comedy-drama films

Plot

Background and production

Cast

Release

Home Video

Reception

See also

External links

References