Sundance Film Festival 2015
Plated In Gold: The Strongest Man at Sundance
Beef (Robert “Meatball” Lorie) and Conan (Paul Chamberlain) are best friends who gracelessly and humorously carry out a Don Quixote and Sancho Panza–style journey in The Strongest Man, a 2015 Sundance film in the “NEXT” section. “I think I have a hard time not putting some comedy in there,” says Kenny Riches, the film’s writer and director.
Sundance Film Review: Pervert Park
Florida Justice Transition is an adults-only trailer-home community—that’s because it’s a space designed for previously convicted sex offenders reintegrating into society, post-incarceration. … read more
Sundance Film Review: 6 Desires: DH Lawrence and Sardinia
On paper, this film comes across as pretty damn intellectually daunting—the type of film that goes over your head. But something about the director’s rhythmic narration set to images of dew-flecked spider webs succeed in transporting the audience into this strange world that appears to have remained unchanged since the 1920s. … read more
Sundance Film Review: It Follows
David Robert Mitchell’s dissection of the paranoia and emotional detachment that plagues our suburbs is the genesis of this fresh interpretation of the horror genre. It Follows feels like a natural progression of the teenage horror film—one that uses the complexity of today’s young people as a canvas for some expertly-crafted, psychosexual drama. … read more
Sundance Film Review: The Summer of Sangaile
Set in Lithuania and spoken in Lithuanian, Sangailé (Julija Steponaityté) is a timid, adolescent young woman who marvels at such stunt planes, but she fears heights on account of her vertigo. Austé (Aisté Diržiūté) coaxes her to hang out with her and her friends group; eventually, the two girls become lovers as Austé, an aspiring fashion designer/photographer, threads her way into Sangailé’s heart by making clothes for and taking photos of her. … read more
Sundance Film Review: The Amina Profile
The Amina Profile documentary follows Montrealer Sandra Bagaria’s online relationship with Amina Arraf, a lesbian woman from Damascus, Syria, near the onset of the Arab Revolution. … read more
Sundance Film Review: Chorus
Chorus is shot in a dreary black and white that underlines the turmoil with which Irène (Fanny Mallette) and Christophe (Sébastien Ricard) have suffered for 10 years, since the disappearance and presumed death of their son in Quebec. … read more
Sundance Film Review: Things of the Aimless Wanderer
Things of the Aimless Wanderer, a film in the New Frontiers section of Sundance programming, challenges traditional approaches to narrative filmmaking. This drama offers three disjointed accounts of what became of a disappeared black girl in an East/Central African country (likely Rwanda) after she had a fling with a white, American journalist/travel writer—presented as “Working Hypotheses,” each claimed to be based on a “true story.” … read more
Sundance Film Review: Censored Voices
Censored Voices recollects recordings from Israeli soldiers of the Six Days War, originally recorded by Amos Oz. This documentary reveals their true feelings—as opposed to proclamations of national pride—about the pressures of Zionism and the horrors and hypocrisy of war. … read more
Sundance Film Review: Homesick
Homesick is an interesting character study of Charlotte, who must work to forgive her mother and—for lack of better words—grow up by delving into this queerness. It’s an interesting, fun drama that thrives in the discomfort it engenders with Charlotte’s and Henrik’s transgressive love. … read more