Houstonia’s The Must List tells you about something going on in Houston that you absolutely cannot miss.

“Change Perceptions. Remove Stigma. Eliminate Barriers.” ReelAbilities Houston Film and Arts Festival’s motto succinctly embodies the mission it’s held for over a decade: creating space for filmmakers, visual artists, musicians, and other creatives with disabilities to share their work and experiences with over 8,000 attendees annually. This year’s festivities run from February 2 through 23, presented by the Jewish Family Services Houston Alexander Institute for Inclusion and the Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities.

Most of the events are free, though some do have a cover charge. They’ll also be held at different locations around the city, including United Way of Greater Houston, River Oaks Theatre, Sabine Street Studios, White Oak Music Hall, among others.

“It’s like a behemoth in what it offers the city of Houston in terms of celebrating the lives of works of individuals with apparent and non-apparent disabilities,” says ReelAbilities festival chair Jeffrey Feinstein.

ReelAbilities Houston is one of 11 affiliate festivals of ReelAbilities International, originally founded in New York City in 2007. All the host cities share the same goal of making the arts more accessible to creatives with disabilities, with the Houston chapter divided into four categories: ReelArt, featuring an art crawl and receptions showcasing works by adults with disabilities working with the Celebration Company; ReelFilm, the film festival; ReelEducation, providing local classrooms with free lessons on inclusion and accessibility; and ReelWorkplace, which helps companies better understand and accommodate the needs of employees with disabilities. There will also be a music festival on February 20, with performances by some new faces, some veterans of the showcase, and the ReelMusic house band, in a range of genres including rock and jazz.

“It brings the house down every year… It’s a packed room, and it’s just, for a lot of people, kind of the highlight of the festival itself. It’s where the fireworks go off,” Feinstein says.

He calls curating the film festival “the fun part” of his chair responsibilities, which he shares with his wife, Allison. They spent up to six weeks seeking out the 2025 slate of movies, watching screeners for both feature-length and short films, international and domestic releases, and paying attention to any other surprises that may have popped up in theaters or on streaming services along the way. This year’s selections include the feature film Ezra (directed by Tony Goldwyn) and documentaries Left Alone Rhapsody (by Stewart M. Schulman), Mind/Game: The Unquiet Journey of Chamique Holdsclaw (by Rick Goldsmith), To My Father (by Sean Schiavolin), and Dear Ani (by Micah Levin).

“We’re trying to show what we think will be captivating to an audience,” Feinstein says. “Some that may be appropriate, or maybe not so appropriate. Some have a really tough message, and some have a lighter one.”

The Mind/Game showing also includes a discussion with Dr. Lennie Waite and other special guests to discuss critical mental health topics. Both Left Alone Rhapsody and Dear Ani will feature appearances by the documentaries’ focal points, John Bayless and Keith Wasserman, respectively. For Wasserman, who produces as well as stars in Dear Ani, ReelAbilities allows him to challenge prevailing notions that all disabilities are physical and visible.

“This festival is both for those that have disabilities that are externalized and also not so much. And I think I fall into that latter category of more mental health,” he says. “It’s easy for me to appear as though I don’t have a disability, as it were. My particular flavor of mania, manic depression, if you will, sort of enables me to have really fiery blasts of creative output, but then really sort of taper off and get lost, get distracted, move on to the next thing.”

These factors create some hurdles in the creation process, which Wasserman notes can be problematic when it comes to completing a project.

“It has been wonderful having a creative partner who can take the baton and then take a lap and hand it back to me with a specific task,” he says.

All of ReelAbilities Houston’s events comply with ADA regulations, to help ensure the events are as accessible to attendees as possible. Feinstein points out that the festival’s partners all have ADA compliant buildings, and when newer venues come on board, they’ll make any necessary upgrades to conform to accessibility standards. One of the older spaces joining in this year will be altering and expanding its ramps, for example. It’s a significant component of ReelAbilities Houston’s ethos of art for everyone.

“When we enter a room, we’re scanning like we’re like Batman,” Feinstein says. “We’re always at the forefront of making sure that we have accessibility across a wide variety of disabilities.”