This year’s Ebert Fellows attended the True/False Film Festival, one of the most essential non-fiction cinema events of the year. Here are their reports:
PAIGE TERNADO
“To really make a film like this, you have to ignore every commercial model that we’re sold.” Filmmaker Patrick Bresnan, whose documentary “First They Came for My College” tells a lot more than one story, says this as I hurry after him, recording our walk-and-talk down the streets of Columbus, Missouri.
“In these situations,” he says, “when you focus on one professor or one student or one situation, you alienate the suffering of all the other people who are going through it. You unfortunately fail in what you’re trying to do.”
At the True/False Film Festival, which took place in March, “First They Came for My College” generated a buzz in the air and a distinct current of resistance in those who were gripped by the world premiere. Director Bresnan’s film is about New College of Florida, a public liberal arts school in conservative Sarasota, and how the rise of a reactionary government tore the school apart, even before the second coming of Trump.
The troubles for New College began in 2023, when Florida’s Governor, Ron DeSantis, targeted the progressive educational enclave for a permanent makeover. The school’s president was canned; the board of trustees, whisked to the side, making room for new trustees agreeable to the mission of reorienting New College in a different and, to the conservative forces behind the mission, less troubling direction. Gone were the campus gardens, the Gender Studies courses, and the Title IX office. The community spoke out, as did the professors and the students about to graduate, many of whom became the documentary’s narrative threads.
Slowly but surely, the punitive restrictions that came for New College, as chronicled by Bresnan, have spread to educational institutions all over Trump’s America. At my alma mater, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, I have seen funding slashed for so many programs, from science to the arts. Yet not all hope is lost, and in “First They Came For My College,” the voices of rage and resistance give the documentary a vital sense of purpose.
True/False stands in stark contrast to Ebertfest, this year (a month after True/False) marking its apparent “Last Dance,” as the official 2026 edition called it.
There was an air of solemnity, as it was the final year of this 27-year-old downtown Champaign Virginia Theatre tradition, begun by the late film critic Roger Ebert, a Champaign native and U of I graduate. Since Roger’s death, the festival tradition continued under the direction of Chaz Ebert and Nate Kohn.
My own ties to the festival were not simply due to the Ebert Fellowship. Here’s how I heard the story: In the late 1800s, Joseph and Katharina Ebert were traveling via train, and found a little baby swaddled in a basket, abandoned. The couple had been wanting a baby of their own, and took her in.
The baby was my great-great-grandmother, Mayme. Joseph and Katharina had several more children, including a son named Walter. Walter ended up having one child of his own, my cousin Roger Ebert.
Many ask if I knew Roger and what he was like. Unfortunately, he passed away before I got the chance to truly know him. Though our family ties are convoluted and not by physical blood, I inherited some of Roger’s passion for film and storytelling. I find myself drawn to the same stories he was—stories where we can empathize with those with lives different than ours.
The films shown in this final Ebertfest were perfectly representative of what filmmaking and moviegoing can be, and should be. This year’s titles, such as “Mi Familia,” “Bob Trevino Likes It,” and “Charliebird,” dared anyone to leave the theater with a dry eye. Older films screened last month at Ebertfest, including Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” and Buster Keaton’s “The General,” are classics in their own right, separated by nearly a century. The festival has always had one eye on where filmmaking has come from, and the other on what is yet to come. True/False, in its documentary focus and love of the here and now, filled my chest with hope.
I can only imagine Roger is excited for all of it, as we face our future with film.
AMIR REHAB
“Movies are like a machine that generates empathy.” This is one of Roger Ebert’s most famous and repeated quotes, and it was heard—and emphasized—through the “Last Dance” farewell edition of Ebertfest, held in April at the Virginia Theatre in Champaign, IL., where Ebert grew up and attended the University of Illinois. The university lost a large portion of its funding this year and was no longer in a position to support the annual Ebertfest event.
The meaning behind the empathy quote is simple and powerful. When we watch a movie, it trains us to place ourselves in the characters’ shoes—to empathize, connect, and feel. Movies are not purely entertainment; they are experiences that allow us to better understand other people and their realities. My last two years at the U of I hold a special place in my heart, thanks to the campus and Champaign-Urbana itself. For that reason, this final Ebertfest felt especially meaningful, with each screening in mid-April carrying an extra emotional weight.
One movie that particularly spoke to me was “Mi Familia,” from writer-director Gregory Nava, a frequent Ebertfest guest over the years. The 1995 film draws from Nava’s own family history while incorporating the stories and experiences of many Latino Americans. It follows the Sánchez family across generations and represents an evolution of Mexican-American identity. The first generation centers on survival and sacrifice. The second generation reflects conflict, belonging, and the challenge of adapting to American culture while preserving cultural roots. The third generation focuses on self-definition—the ability to decide who you are on your own terms rather than being shaped only by tradition or society.
Watching the film, I found myself reflecting on my own family history. Coming from an Algerian Arab background, Nava’s story spoke to my father’s experiences and the lives of my grandparents, who lived through the period when France colonized Algeria. Although the histories are different, I recognized similar themes of struggle, identity, and resilience extending from one generation to the next.
One of the great things about the compact, easygoing nature of Ebertfest was getting to speak with Gregory Nava and his wife, producer Barbara Martinez, after the screening, at the nearby Big Grove Tavern. (Festival guests and film presenters mixed it up between screenings there all weekend.) I had to build up the courage to approach them; it’s not every day you get to speak directly with the filmmaker behind a festival screening of something that meant something to you. After a quick introduction, we sat—me, Nava, and Nava’s producer and filmmaker wife, Barbara Martinez—and we talked: about my background, about my feelings about his movie, about Nava’s visit to a Cairo film festival, where he met directors from all over North Africa. He told me many of them connected deeply with “Mi Familia,” and our conversation proved the value of Ebert’s phrase about the movies and empathy.
Before this year, and before my time as a U of I College of Media Ebert Fellow, the film festival experience–any film festival experience–was unknown territory. My back-to-back introductions to the Columbia, MO. True/False Film Festival in March and the April Ebertfest changed that. As different as the two were, they both helped me appreciate film in a deeper way. Larger in number of venues and screenings, though narrower than Ebertfest in its focus on nonfiction work only, True/False created an urgent, socially engaged, and community-driven atmosphere, with audiences participating in conversations all over downtown Columbia about people, society, and truth.
The “Last Dance” Ebertfest felt more reflective and, given the circumstances, more emotional, with a sense of history and bittersweet closure. Ebertfest showed me how powerful film and festival-going can be when it is connected to memory, legacy, and personal reflection. What I enjoyed most of all, at both experiences, was the feeling of the movie not ending when the credits rolled. At both True/False and Ebertfest, the post-screening discussions, the audience reactions, and the shared emotions made everything more alive. Watching a film alone, at home, or in a regular multiplex can still be meaningful. But watching it in a festival setting makes it feel like a conversation with a brand new community.
JIN WANG
A film festival is more than just watching movies; it creates an environment where movies become part of a larger conversation among audiences, filmmakers, and the community around them. People discuss movies in nearby cafes, and the overall impression you get when overhearing this or that discussion is this: You should not and cannot possibly miss anything being shown here.
This impression turned out to be one of the strongest aspects of my first-ever festival experiences recently, as part of the U of I College of Media Roger Ebert Fellowship. At the True/False Film Festival in March, the movie and conversation energy spread throughout downtown Columbia, MO., in coffeehouses, restaurants, on hilly sidewalks near the University of Missouri campus, in line for the next screening.
True/False and, a month later, the final edition of the Roger Ebert Film Festival, aka Ebertfest, in downtown Champaign, IL, gave me my first and second film festival opportunities. Both were welcoming and personally meaningful, providing ways of establishing connections with people, with culture, and with community through the medium of film. Hearing filmmakers talk about the films we saw, immediately after seeing them on screen, showed the audience how cinema can bridge language and cultural differences and create an empathetic shared space.
While both Ebertfest and True/False are dedicated to films and filmmakers, the differences between the two were many. The larger True/False, focused on documentary work, covered many areas of downtown Columbia. The feeling there was open, with choices of venues and films to be made each day. Some films were shown in a bar, or in the back of a bakery and restaurant; the atmosphere was really lively, chaotic, and joyful. Walking through downtown Columbia felt like walking through a living art space.
Ebertfest was very different: smaller, easier, with a single, enormous and beautiful venue, the historic Virginia Theatre, serving as the screening location. The format felt organized, orderly, and free from decisions about what to see and where. One space, one collective emotional rhythm.
I came to these two festivals as an international student relatively new to both Central Illinois (and Missouri) and the film festival experience. At True/False, the standout for me was “Pinball,” directed by Naveen Chaubal. It is a film about Yosef, an Iraqi refugee whose family fled to Egypt and then to Louisville, KY., after the US invasion of Iraq.
One particular scene in the documentary finds Yosef returning to Egypt with his sister. They find themselves near the apartment where they used to live. In a small restaurant, he eats his favorite dish from childhood, and his face suddenly changes; the memory of earlier years and experiences flows back into him. This particular scene creates intimacy rather than any kind of overt drama. The camera is positioned close enough to show Yosef’s face without being emotionally intrusive. Another memorable sequence finds Yosef running and doing different exercises, breathing heavily. Through those moments, the director establishes a connection between the body and the protagonist’s need to find his home, as if physical movement is the only thing that can liberate him from uncertainty.
For some of us in the True/False audience for “Pinball,” born and raised in more than one country or culture, Yosef’s search felt especially relevant. Returning to childhood memories and places, connecting via such things as food, memory, and family, provides an opportunity to feel the difficulty of what it means to be part of two places at once. An individual may have connections with many different cultures yet remain unsure about where their true home is. In “Pinball,” the story of Yosef becomes part of something greater: humanity’s struggle for self-understanding.
The Q&A discussions with the filmmakers after the movies made everything more meaningful. The comments by the filmmakers illuminated many of the scenes; equally important were the reactions of audience members. At both True/False and Ebertfest, these extra experiences achieved something special: a chance to learn how a piece of art brings people together. Staying for the post-screening discussions became one of the most enjoyable elements of the festivals.
If it meant a delayed lunch, it was well worthwhile. The discussions have stayed in my mind, just as the movies have.
