Chicago Showcase: Superfest Disability Film Festival + Code of the Freaks Reunion Panel & Superfest Talk-Back
October 17, 2025
3:30 PM - 6:45 PM
Location
Daley Library 1-470 (and Zoom for the panel only)
Address
801 S. Morgan St., Chicago, IL 60607
Calendar
Download iCal FileJoin the UIC Disability Cultural Center for the 2025
Chicago Showcase of Superfest Disability Film Festival (In Person)
Friday, October 17
3:30-5:50pm
Daley Library, 1-470
Plus!
Code of the Freaks Reunion Panel & Superfest Talk-Back (Hybrid)
6:00pm-6:45pm
Daley Library, 1-470 & On Zoom, https://go.uic.edu/Superfest2025
We are thrilled to host an in-person screening of Superfest Disability Film Festival’s exciting line-up. We will also convene a hybrid Code of the Freaks Reunion Panel & Superfest Talk-Back featuring UIC faculty Dr. Carrie Sandahl, Dr. Aly Patsavas, and Dr. Azadeh Safaeian, with Chicago-based director Salome Chasnoff.
About the panel
2025 marks the five-year anniversary of Code of the Freaks, a feature-length documentary that “radically refram[es] the use of disabled characters in film.” Centering the voices of 13 disabled scholars, artists, and critics, COTF analyzes Hollywood representations of disability and finds them sorely lacking. Our panelists will weigh in on COTF’s themes, five years later, and share their reflections on the Superfest films.
Tune in on Zoom after watching at home, or come in person and join in the conversation!
What is Superfest?
Superfest Disability Film Festival is the longest running disability film festival in the world. Since it first debuted in a small Los Angeles showcase in 1970 it has become an eagerly anticipated international event—hosted by Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability at San Francisco State. For more than 30 years, Superfest has celebrated cutting-edge cinema that portrays disability through a diverse, complex, unabashed and engaging lens.
Covid safety:
UIC does not require masking, but we are still masking indoors as an accessibility measure for chronically ill / immunocompromised folks and those living interdependently with them. Please wear a mask! We’ll have extras on hand. Some people may unmask briefly to eat refreshments, but we’ll have a “no unmasking” area designated to make physical distancing possible.
Access info:
- CART (live captions), ASL, and audio description services will be provided.
- UIC’s Daley Library is located near the Blue Line, Harrison bus, and Halsted bus. There is a drop-off friendly cul de sac on Morgan Street, and parking is available at 1100 W. Harrison Street or at Halsted & Taylor.
- The Library has binary bathrooms with accessible stalls, as well as a single-stall all-gender and accessible restroom on the second floor. We’ll have people available for access requests: opening doors, giving directions, etc.
- Contact dcc@uic.edu with any other access questions or requests.
Chicago Showcase Line-up (listed alphabetically)
-
Audio Description (Innovation in Craft Award), 5 minutes
- CW: none
- After making a wish on his birthday, a lonely visually impaired man finds his world turned upside down by an unexpected encounter.
-
Equal World (Best of Festival - Documentary), 23 minutes
- CW: none
- ‘Equal World?’ - Not a question. A right.The film follows disability advocate Abia Akram as she platforms the voices of three young people with disabilities: Tapiwa, Taqwa, and Basiru. It shows their daily lives and talks to what is needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and an inclusive society. These intimate portraits of young campaigners allow the audience invaluable insight into why youths with disabilities are essential partners in getting the SDGs back on track.
-
Kisses (Innovation in Craft Award), 8 minutes
- CW: sexual content
- Mia, a young woman who uses a wheelchair and lives with her conservative father, is curious about love. When James, a young man with secrets, unexpectedly enters her life, she embarks on a bold journey of intimacy and self-discovery. However, an unexpected twist forces them to confront everything they thought they knew about themselves and each other.
-
Les Monstres (Little Monsters) (Best of Festival - Fiction), 14 minutes
- CW: bullying, language
- Today, visually impaired teenager Erwan can’t wait to get to school to declare his love for Agathe. Unfortunately, he first has to share a medical transport van with David, a wheelchair-bound suck-up, who tries everyday to make friends with Erwan, quite unsuccessfully. When David tries to make sure they never arrive, war is declared.
-
Renegades: Untold Stories of Black Americans (Disability Justice Award), 15 min episode
- CW: ableism, trauma
- RENEGADES is a new digital series of documentary shorts showcasing the lives and cultural contributions of little-known historical figures with disabilities. Hosted by award-winning musician and disability rights champion Lachi, and made by a team of D/deaf and disabled filmmakers, the project is designed to increase public knowledge of disability history, and encourage cross-cultural understanding between non-disabled people and those with disabilities - who make up more than 1 in 4 adults in America today.
-
Rising Tides, Raising Voices (Advocacy Award), 15 minutes
- CW: retellings of distressing evacuations, climate change
- The Pacific region is among the most impacted in the world by climate change. As part of a legacy of systemic oppression, Indigenous Pacific Islanders with disabilities are particularly at risk. Because they are less likely to be formally employed, their livelihoods depend on fishing and farming - which have been significantly affected by climate change. During disasters, the structural barriers that Pacific Islanders with disabilities face every day - like the lack of accessible information and transportation - can become a death sentence. Faced with the urgency of increasing disasters, disabled grassroots activists across the Pacific are championing disability-inclusive climate action. It’s a fight not just against nature, but against a world that often overlooks people with disabilities. Rising Tides, Raising Voices is a call for intersectional, inclusive, community-led solutions to the encroaching global crisis.
-
Viejito/Enfermito/Grito (Old Man/Sick Man/Shout), 10 minutes
- CW: Touches upon HIV
- Ananias, an SF Bay Area artist and immigrant, performs the folkloric Danza de los Viejitos (the Dance of the Old Men). Originally from Michoacán, Mexico, where the dance originates, Ananias interprets its movements through the lens of his spirituality, his long-term HIV-related disabilities, and his search for a place in the world.
-
Voice Notes from Palestine (Disability Justice Award), 10 minutes
- CW: shows an active genocide, physical violence, mass destruction and poverty
- Voice Notes from Palestine, a short film by filmmaker Amal Al-Agroobi and Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), features the testimonies of several Palestinian students with disabilities from the Islamic University of Gaza. The students recount their experiences in occupied Gaza under siege and bombardment by the Israeli military.
Can't join us? The films will be available for streaming October 16-October 19.
Read about all of the films at :
https://superfestfilm.org/2025-films
Content warnings for the films
Flyer description: A Superfest logo with a purple film reel is surrounded by movie posters and film stills for 2025 films. A purple block above says "UIC Disability Cultural Center, Chicago Showcase," and a purple block below announces event details and a "Code of the Freaks Reunion Panel & Superfest Talk-Back." Additional text shares details (transcribed above) and there are icons for ASL, CART, and Audio Description.
Date posted
Oct 8, 2025
Date updated
Oct 8, 2025