THB #312: Sundance Wrap-Up

I loved Sundance this year… and it exhausted me.

Literally, I am still recovering from 40 films in less than 10 days. My sleep schedule is almost back to human 4 days after the event wrapped. (A friend closed the festival with 10 movies in 24 hours… wow.)

Here are the 3 prior THB pieces…
#306: The New Sundance Is Here!
#308: Sundance & Rape
#311: Sundance Top 10

I’m going to split the rest between “narratives” (we really need a better word for non-doc films) and documentaries.

NARRATIVES

I’m going to start with the 3 most commercial movies… the horror movies…

Talk To Me - Sold to A24
Infinity Pool - Arrived with a theatrical release scheduled for last Friday (Neon, $2.5m)
My Animal - Bought by Paramount, pre-fest.

All 3 are perfect fits. There is something to love about all 3. For me, My Animal is the one with the most upside. But I like all of them, with Infinity Pool being the most erratic and causing discussions about whether the ejaculating penis belongs to Ms. Skarsgård or not, whether Mia Goth was actually lactating while nursing Mr. Skarsgård, etc. The more you care to have this conversation, the more you will enjoy this film.

Next… the most Sundance-y Sundance movies…

Shortcomings - This is a completely pleasant experience… and Asian-American rom-com directed by a TV actor who directs like a TV director… which is not to say he won’t grow past that. I enjoyed the cast a lot.

Theater Camp - The current comedy mode meets 2003’s Camp, it somehow becomes a movie more about the adults than the kids. I liked it, but it was so self-aware that it loses some of the charm of, well, camp.

Polite Society - Bend It Like Asian Beckham.

You Hurt My Feelings - Nicole Holofcener’s newest work, as she becomes more Woody-Allen-comfortable and less in your face. I feel the consensus, which seems to be that it is very enjoyable and somehow incomplete, is probably on the mark. If you like Holofcener - and I do - you will like it… and probably want a little more afterwards.

A Little Prayer - Junebug, Jr… though this is really a super showcase for David Srathairn, less so than for a rising star, as Amy Adams was when it happened for her. Jane Levy is one of those actresses who always seems to be on the verge of exploding… but just can’t find the film. Strathairn is always a pleasure to watch… and Sony Classics could turn this into his moment.

The Persian Version - A thoughtful examination of assimilation and family. So familiar… but well made.

The veteran filmmakers deep in their personal expressions…

Landscape With Invisible Hand - Cory Finley - I could ‘t quite figure out what this film, from MGM, Annapurna, and Plan B was doing at Sundance without a clear distribution plan. The film is clearly a budget step up from Thoroughbreds, which was a strong accelerant to the careers of Anya Taylor-Joy and Olivia Cooke, as well as Bad Education, the HBO release of a Hugh Jackman movies. And I was even more confused when I really liked the film, which has a really big idea… aliens come to earth and seem benign and supportive of the human species, but encourage and further force on humans some of our worst habits of the current screentime lives. At some point, however, the film loses itself in the split between choosing to chase complexity or simplicity and becomes lost in the process, in spite of some really lovely moments.

Passages - Ira Sachs - Thank God for Ira Sachs. This is not, for me, one of his best films. But it is still an intimate, challenging, thoughtful examination of artists and romance and age and ambition and certain inevitabilities. Adèle Exarchopoulos has a certain magic on camera, beyond her sexiness. For me, this is the best work I have seen from her. She was fascinating in Blue is the Warmest Color, but she seemed a bit lost in it and not completely in control. Here, we get a fully formed actor. Ben Whishaw is always great to watch on film. Here, Sachs puts less on his shoulders and we get even more, as he gets a character who is even more reactive than usual. (Usually, we want actors to be more active than reactive… but Whishaw is at his best when has the time and space to think things through for us, the audience.) And while I have really liked Franz Rogowski before, I found his character amazingly irritating from start to finish here… which may be a triumph.

Rotting in the Sun - Kind of like Brandon Cronenberg, when you see Sebastian Silva’s name as you head into a festival, you know you are going to be pushed… in Sebastian’s case, you’re heading someplace funnier and gayer than Brandon. And sure enough, Sebastian goes for it here. He plays himself as the subject of an self-described online star’s obsessive search for Sebastian… who may or may not die during the film. Catalina Saavedra, who became known to Sundance audiences with The Maid in 2009’s The Maid, plays The Maid, who somewhat grounds the story. Viewers will be as likely to love the film as to hate it… which seems to be where Silva likes to live as a filmmaker. But I, for one, am always happy to see what he is up to.

Hmmmm…

Eileen - I really enjoyed the build to this period tale, with Thomasin McKenzie coming out of her shell and Anne Hathaway as the woman ahead of her time. Then, as the film makes its turn, I was less interested in that movie than the one that was on offer before that twist.

Bad Behaviour - Jennifer Connelly is one of the best actors who has never really been given the room to do the work she is capable of delivering. Yes, she has an Oscar. But it’s been 21 years since. And the really challenging work she has done since has mostly been lost to flawed films or being in the shadow of others. I think she may be coming into her prime, finally allowed by audiences to get past that face of hers. You can see her freeing herself of those shackles in this film. But Alice Enlgert offers a ton of promise, but a bit too much complication in this film for it to be the accelerant than Connelly needs to explode again. It’s like watching both of them rehearse for a great future.

DOCUMENTARIES

Special (Visual) Experiences

Squaring The Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis) - I’m an Anton Corbijn fan. Control and The American are films I will stop and watch whenever they turn up. The music videos. This film, about the 2 men who became the leaders in setting the agenda for album covers for over a decade, is endless fun. The stories. The memories. The art. It’s not Moonage Daydream… not trying to be. But for anyone who loved album art in the 70s, it is a must see. Great footage and terrific current interviews.

Fantastic Machine - The story of the camera, this is a breath of fresh air in the era of the selfie. Stop and think about what the image means. Wonderful, thoughtful, beautiful doc.

Smoke Sauna Sisterhood - Anna Hints takes an intimate tradition of some women in Estonia and delivers something beutiful and insightful, happy and sad, light and weighty.

Solid, As Expected

Judy Blume Forever - The name tells you all you need to know. She is a legend. Her work taught us all things that are complicated and brought to to a place where we, as kids, could understand them intuitively. Good film. By the book.

Food and Country - Another film trying to explain to us how we have completely screwed up how food is made and commoditized in America It’s good. A little repetitive and a bit too interested in Ruth Reichl… could have picked a lane a bit more specifically. But worth the while for sure.

Going To Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project - In a Sundance without Invisible Beauty, this film would feel more significant. It is absolutely significant. Nikki Giovanni is a force of nature and I am happy to know so much about her journey and her work as a poet. The film reaches for style, which didn’t add much for me. But a solid doc.

Going Varsity in Mariachi - A classic feel-good Sundance doc… story that you didn’t know… people making an effort to rise above… what’s not to love? Just not a surprise.

A Bit Above

Is There Anybody Out There - Ella Glendining has a condition you may well never have heard of. As best I can recall the way of explaining, it is that the femur doesn’t full develop and the legs are set in an unusual way… extremely unusual. As much as this is a personal journey and an explanation of what it is like to be differently abled in this world, the movie itself is a testament to how a disability that seems extreme, doesn’t neccesarily keep people from doing and doing at the highest level.

Bad Press - White America has abused Native Americans for centuries. But sometimes, bad things happen inside in worlds where bad things have already happened from the outside. This film is the story of an effort to silence the media within The Muscogee Nation. In many ways, the film is very, very familiar… each story having value, but expected. But where this is happening and to whom makes the film unique.

Beyond Utopia - Literally escaping North Korea. This movie takes you on that journey, not just having the conversation about doing it. Madeleine Gavin has made a career of taking us where we “can’t go.” A women’s prison, into the lives of women in the Congo, and now on this life and death journey.

And that is all he wrote.

I feel a little bad, as I wrap up, reducing so much work… so much great work… into a paragraph here or there. There is not one of these films that is not worthy of a good long discussion after seeing them. People spend weeks and months and years doing this work. And they have already broken through, landing at Sundance ahead of thousands of other submissions. It is too easy for me, as one viewer - however versed in doing this - to sum it all up in a few sentences, pro or con.

But I guess that is the gig.

Until tomorrow…