The nomadic Alternativa Film Festival travelled over 7,000 miles between its original launchpad of Kazakhstan and Medellín, Colombia, for its third edition. But one of the great audience successes of the festival this year came from close to its roots: Nurzhamal Karamoldoeva’s “Only Heaven Knows,” made by a majority Kyrgyz creative team and shot in Chicago.

The drama trails Mira (Malika Kanatova), a nail salon worker married to truck driver Eric (Dauren Tashkenbaev). When her husband goes missing, the young woman must uncover his tormentuous double life, including a rampant gambling addiction and piling debts to dangerous men.…