It shouldn’t come as a surprise that, given the word “diversity” dominating recent conversations around the film industry, a festival like Sundance can act an alternative to the homogeneity of the mainstream. By its very nature, independent filmmaking provides more diverse, unique and personal stories, and it’s only upon seeing these kinds of films that one can get a true sense of the importance of opening up to new perspectives. Andrew Ahn’s Spa Night, screening in Sundance’s Official U.S. Dramatic Competition, is a perfect example, a coming-of-age tale that’s refreshing just for the fact that it shines a light on an area of society that’s rarely put on film.

Taking place in Koreatown in Los Angeles, Spa Night follows David (Joe Seo), the son of Korean immigrants Soyoung (Haerry Kim) and Jin (Youn Ho Cho). David’s parents own a restaurant, and he’s been happy to forego attending college in order to help his family’s business. But once the restaurant shuts down, things change significantly for David and his family: Soyoung starts working as a waitress at a restaurant owned by one of her friends at church, Jin turns to drinking in order to cope with his inability to find work, and David starts becoming aware of his attraction towards men. Pushed by his parents to retake his SATs so he can go to college, David decides to find a job instead, working at a Korean spa that doubles as a site for discreet gay hook-ups. The spa serves as a heightened middle ground for David, providing an opportunity to explore his sexual identity while not straying too far from his own cultural comfort zone.

The film’s specificity, combined with Ahn’s sensitivity towards his own characters, go a long way to establishing Spa Night’s unique placement among US cinema, but those factors don’t change how inert the movie feels on an emotional level. David represses his homosexuality due to his religious upbringing and parents’ conservatism (when he asks how they’d feel about him dating a white woman, they stare at him with stunned, disapproving silence), which Ahn reflects through his rigid and detached form, making it hard to invest in David’s internal struggles. Beyond his attraction to men, it’s hard to pin down what exactly David might be feeling about his situation, shutting off any possibility of engaging with David’s story on a character level.

The same can’t be said for David’s parents, whose attempts to recover from losing their business help fill in the film’s emotional gaps. Haerry Kim and Youn Ho Cho both give great performances as David’s parents, but it’s Kim as Soyoung who steals the film from her co-stars. As her character transitions into the family breadwinner after the restaurant’s closure, Kim makes every aspect of Soyoung’s painful adjustment felt. The success of this subplot only makes Ahn’s issues with making David’s storyline resonate all the more frustrating.

The saying goes that time heals all wounds, but in A Good Wife time also uncovers new ones. For middle-aged housewife Milena (writer/director Mirjana Karanovic, making her first feature), life is going well. Her eldest daughter is a successful artist, her two younger children are doing great in school, and her husband Vlada (Boris Isakovic) makes sure she lives a comfy life. When Milena cleans around the house one day, she discovers a VHS tape containing footage of her husband committing war crimes during his days as a soldier. A disturbed Milena puts the tape back, telling no one of what she saw, but word starts getting around that the authorities might have already started investigating Vlada, and the threat of his arrest throws Milena’s happy life into turmoil. At the same time, a check-up at the doctor’s leads to the discovery of a large lump in one of her breasts, and despite Milena’s attempts to avoid getting it checked further, it’s clear that her life is about to go through some major changes.

Karanovic, an accomplished Serbian actress who’s been working for over three decades, shows she has plenty of talent behind the camera as well, directing in a subdued manner that places characters and themes at the forefront. The same can’t necessarily be said about her screenplay, which leans on some heavy-handed metaphors and familiar ideas that can’t help but feel stale. Karanovic makes the link between Milena’s tumor and her willful ignorance of the past impossible to miss, and even with the unique angle of the Yugoslav Wars, watching Milena’s growing awareness of her own domestication as more of a self-imposed prison sentence isn’t especially exciting. But the screenplay’s staleness only ends up being a slight bother, as Karanovic’s direction and captivating performance keep things from falling into tedium. A Good Wife has its flaws, but as a directorial debut, it shows enough promise to hope that it won’t be the only time Karanovic takes a seat in the director’s chair.

One of the great joys (or miseries, depending on your perspective) of attending a film festival is seeing films that may never be seen by a wide audience. Hundreds of films come to Park City, Utah each January with the hopes of being loved and subsequently picked up by one of the major indie film companies—without being sold at the Sundance Film Festival, there is no real guarantee that your film will ever be seen again.

Check out the up-to-date list of the films that have been sold this year. These are likely the films that will be raved about in 12 months as some of the best of the year, so take note.

A24

The End of the Tour
Director: James Ponsoldt (The Spectacular Now)
Starring: Jason Segel, Jesse Eisenberg, Anna Chlumsky
A magazine reporter recounts his travels and conversations with author David Foster Wallace during a promotional book tour.

Mississippi Grind
Director: Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck (Little Miss Sunshine)
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Ben Mednelsohn, Sienna Miller
Down on his luck and facing financial hardship, Gerry teams up with younger charismatic poker player, Curtis, in an attempt to change his luck. The two set off on a road trip through the South with visions of winning back what’s been lost.

The Witch
Director: Robert Eggers (Debut)
Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Ralph Ineson
William and Katherine lead a devout Christian life, homesteading on the edge of an impassible wilderness, with five children. When their newborn son mysteriously vanishes and their crops fail, the family begins to turn on one another.

Alchemy

Strangerland
Director: Kim Farrant (Naked on the Inside)
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Hugo Weaving, Joseph Fiennes
A family finds their dull life in a rural outback town rocked after their two teenage children disappear into the desert, sparking disturbing rumors of their past.

Zipper
Director: Mora Stephens (Conventioneers)
Starring: Lena Headey, Dianna Agron, Patrick Wilson
A family man who has it all until he risks losing everything due to his inability to fight off his obsessive temptation for other women.

Bleeker Street

I’ll See You in My Dreams
Director: Brett Haley (The New Year)
Starring: Blythe Danner, Martin Starr, Sam Elliott
Carol, a widow in her 70’s, is forced to confront her fears about love, family, and death. After her routine is rattled she decides to start dating again and falls into relationships with two very different men.

Broad Green

A Walk in the Woods
Director: Ken Kwapis (He’s Just Not That into You)
Starring: Robert Redford, Nick Nolte
After spending two decades in England, Bill Bryson returns to the U.S., where he decides the best way to connect with his homeland is to hike the Appalachian Trail with one of his oldest friends.

Film Arcade

Unexpected
Director: Kris Swanberg (Empire Builder)
Starring: Gail Bean, DuShon Monique Brown, Anders Holm
An inner-city high school teacher discovers she is pregnant at the same time as one of her most promising students and the two develop an unlikely friendship while struggling to navigate their unexpected pregnancies.

Focus Features

Cop Car
Director: Jon Watts (Clown)
Starring: Kevin Bacon, Shea Whigham
A small town sheriff sets out to find the two kids who have taken his car on a joy ride.

Fortissimo

Songs My Brothers Taught Me
Director: Chloé Zhao (Post)
Starring: Irene Bedard, Dakota Brown
High school senior Johnny is fixing to leave the Pine Ridge Reservation when the unexpected death of his rodeo-cowboy father complicates things.

Fox Searchlight

Brooklyn
Director: John Crowley (Boy A)
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Domhnall Gleeson
In 1950s Ireland and New York, young Ellis Lacey has to choose between two men and two countries.

Me, Earl and the Dying Girl
Director: Alfonso Gomez-Rejon (The Town That Dreaded Sundown)
Starring: Jon Bernthal, Nick Offerman, Connie Britton
A teenage filmmaker befriends a classmate with cancer.

Mistress America
Director: Noah Baumbach (Frances Ha)
Starring: Greta Gerwig, Lola Kirke
A lonely college freshman’s life is turned upside down by her impetuous, adventurous soon-to-be stepsister.

Gravitas Ventures

Being Evel
Director: Daniel Junge (Saving Face)
The real story behind the myth of American icon Robert ‘Evel’ Knievel and his legacy.

HBO

3 1/2 Minutes
Director: Marc Silver (Who Is Dayani Cristal?)
Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving November 2012, four boys in a red SUV pull into a gas station after spending time at the mall buying sneakers and talking to girls. With music blaring, one boy exits the car and enters the store, a quick stop for a soda and a pack of gum. 3 1/2 minutes and ten bullets later, one of the boys is dead.

IFC Films

The D Train
Director: Andrew Mogel & Jarrad Paul (Writers, Yes Man)
Starring: James Marsend, Kathryn Hahn, Jack Black
The head of a high school reunion committee travels to Los Angeles to track down the most popular guy from his graduating class and convince him to go to the reunion.

Sleeping with Other People
Director: Leslye Headland (Bachelorette)
Starring: Alison Brie, Jason Sudekis
A good-natured womanizer and a serial cheater form a platonic relationship that helps reform them in ways, while a mutual attraction sets in.

IFC Midnight

The Hallow
Director: Corin Hardy (debut)
Starring: Bojana Novakovic, Michael McElhatton, Joseph Mawle
A family who move into a remote milllhouse in Ireland find themselves in a fight for survival with demonic creatures living in the woods.

Reversal
Director: Jose Manuel Cravioto (El Mas Buscad)
Starring: Richard Tyson, Amy Okuda
A young girl, chained in the basement of a sexual predator, escapes and turns the tables on her captor.

Kino Lorber

The Forbidden Room
Director: Guy Maddin (My Winnipeg)
Starring: Roy Dupuis, Udo Kier, Louis Negin
A never-before-seen woodsman mysteriously appears aboard a submarine that’s been trapped deep under water for months with an unstable cargo. As the terrified crew make their way through the corridors of the doomed vessel, they find themselves on a voyage into the origins of their darkest fears.

Lionsgate

Don Verdean
Director: Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite)
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Amy Ryan, Jemaine Clement
Biblical archaeologist Don Verdean is hired by a local church pastor to find faith-promoting relics in the Holy Land. But after a fruitless expedition he is forced to get creative in this comedy of faith and fraud.

Knock Knock
Director: Eli Roth (Hostel)
Starring: Keanu reevs, Lorenza Izzo
A pair of femme fatales wreak havoc on the life of a happily married man.

Magnolia

Best of Enemies
Director: Robert Gordon & Morgan Neville (Twenty Feet from Stardom)
Documentary about the legendary series of nationally televised debates in 1968 between two great public intellectuals, the liberal Gore Vidal and the conservative William F. Buckley Jr.

Results
Director: Andrew Bujalski (Computer Chess)
Starring: Guy Pearce, Cobie Smulders, Kevin Corrigan
Two mismatched personal trainers’ lives are upended by the actions of a new, wealthy client.

Tangerine
Director: Sean Baker (Starlet)
Starring: Kiki Kitana Rodriguez, Mya Taylor
A working girl tears through Tinseltown on Christmas Eve searching for the pimp who broke her heart.

The Wolfpack
Director: Crystal Moselle (Debut)
Locked away from society in an apartment on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, the Angulo brothers learn about the outside world through the films that they watch.

Netflix

Hot Girls Wanted
Director: Jill Bauer and Ronna Gradus (Sexy Baby)
A documentary about young women who have been drawn into the sex trade – and how easy it is for a web-savvy generation to end up making porn.

Open Road

Dope
Director: Rick Famuyiwa
Stars: Zoe Kravitz, Forest Whitaker, Tony Revolori
A coming of age comedy/drama for the post hip hop generation. Malcolm is a geek, carefully surviving life in The Bottoms, a tough neighborhood in Inglewood, CA filled gangsters and drugs dealers, while juggling his senior year of college applications, interviews and the SAT.

Orchard

Digging for Fire
Director: Joe Swanberg (Drinking Buddies)
Starring: Jake Johnson, Rosemarie DeWitt, Orlando Bloom, Brie Larson
The discovery of a bone and a gun send a husband and wife on separate adventures over the course of a weekend.

Finders Keepers
Bryan Carberry and J. Clay Tweel (Print the Legend)
Shannon Whisnant has a nose for a bargain. But when he bought a used grill at a North Carolina auction, the severed human foot he found among its ashes was not part of the deal. Soon the gruesome discovery becomes the toast of the infotainment world, and the new owner spies a golden opportunity to cash in on the media frenzy, until struggling addict and amputee John Wood recognizes his missing member and demands his own foot back.

The Overnight
Director: Patrick Brice (Creep)
Starring: Judith Godreche, Adam Scott, Taylor Schilling
Alex, Emily, and their son, RJ, are new to Los Angeles. A chance meeting at the park introduces them to the mysterious Kurt, Charlotte, and Max. A family “playdate” becomes increasingly interesting as the night goes on.

Oscilloscope

The Second Mother
Director: Anna Myulaert (Smoke Gets in Your Eyes)
Starring: Regina Casé
When the estranged daughter of a hard-working live-in housekeeper suddenly appears, the unspoken class barriers that exist within the home are thrown into disarray.

Relativity

The Bronze
Director: Bryan Buckley (Debut)
Starring: Melissa Rauch, Gary Cole
A foul-mouthed former gymnastics bronze medalist must fight for her local celebrity status when a new young athlete’s star rises in town.

Relativity Sports

In Football We Trust
Director: Tony Vainuku & Erika Cohn (Debut)
Presenting a new take on the American immigrant story, this feature length documentary transports viewers deep inside the tightly-knit Polynesian community in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Samuel Goldwyn Films

Fresh Dressed
Director: Sacha Jenkins (debut)
Fresh Dressed chronicles the history of Hip-Hop | Urban fashion and its rise from southern cotton plantations to the gangs of 1970s in the South Bronx, to corporate America, and everywhere in-between.

Screen Media Films

Ten Thousand Saints
Director: Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini (American Splendor)
Starring: Hailee Steinfeld, Ethan Hawke, Asa Butterfield
Set in the 1980s, a teenager from Vermont moves to New York City to live with his father in East Village.

Showtime

Dreamcatcher
Director: Kim Longinotto (Sisters in Law)
For twenty-five years Brenda Myers-Powell called herself ‘Breezy’ and she dominated her world, or that’s what she thought. It was a world that had turned her into a teenage, drug-addicted prostitute. After a violent encounter with a ‘john,’ Brenda woke up in the hospital and decided to change her life.

Sony Pictures Classics

Dark Horse
Director: Louise Osmond (Deep Water)
An inspirational true story of a group of friends from a working men’s club who decide to take on the elite ‘sport of kings’ and breed themselves a racehorse.

The Diary of a Teenage Girl
Director: Marielle Heller (Debut)
Starring: Bel Powley, Alexander Skarsgard, Kristen Wiig
A teen artist living in 1970s San Francisco enters into an affair with her mother’s boyfriend.

Grandma
Director: Paul Weitz (About a Boy)
Starring: Lily Tomlin, Julia Garner, Marcia Gay Harden
Self-described misanthrope Elle Reid has her protective bubble burst when her 18-year-old granddaughter, Sage, shows up needing help. The two of them go on a day-long journey that causes Elle to come to terms with her past and Sage to confront her future.

Sundance Selects

City of Gold
Director: Przemyslaw Reut (Paradox Lake)
As the unabashed cradle of Hollywood superficiality and smoggy urban sprawl, Los Angeles has long been condemned as a cultural wasteland. In the richly penetrating documentary odyssey City of Gold, Pulitzer Prize-winning food critic Jonathan Gold shows us another Los Angeles, where ethnic cooking is a kaleidoscopic portal to the mysteries of an unwieldy city and the soul of America.

Tribeca Film

Misery Loves Comedy
Director: Kevin Pollak (Actor, The Usual Suspects)
Over fifty very famous American and Canadian funny people (filmmakers, writers, actors and comedians) share life and professional journeys and insights, in an effort to shed light on the thesis: Do you have to be miserable to be funny?

After taking home the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, the upcoming documentary The Wolfpack has released a series of videos as a thank you note to the film festival. These thank you videos feature the six Angulo Brothers from The Wolfpack, sweding classic films including The Blair Witch Project, Clerks, El Mariyachi & The Usual Suspects. The prize-winning documentary was acquired by Magnolia Pictures and is expected to debut in 2015.

The Wolfpack is the first documentary from director Crystal Moselle. The forthcoming film features the Angulo family, who are kept locked away from society in a Lower East Side apartment by a domineering father. The Angulo siblings learn about the outside world through the movies they see and swede using homemade props and costumes. Life for the Angulos changes drastically when one brother leaves the apartment and explores New York.

Check out the Angulo Brothers’ swedes of iconic movies below:

The Blair Witch Project

Clerks

The Usual Suspects

El Mariachi

We’ve already seen which films took home precious awards from this year’s Sundance Film Festival; Alfonso Gomez-Rejon’s adaptation of Me and Earl and the Dying Girl received top honors winning the Grand Jury Prize for drama (as well as the Audience Award) and The Wolfpack won on the documentary side of things, directing awards went to Robert Eggers for The Witch and Matthew Heineman for Cartel Land, and other winners include Lee Haugen for Dope, Tim Talbott for The Stanford Prison Experiment and sci-fi drama Advantageous.

But which films generated the most buzz on social media? The infographic below (created by Way To Blue, no affiliation with Way Too Indie, we swear!) shows not only which films were most talked about during Sundance, but also which films people intend to view.

Sundance 2015 Social Media Infographic

This measures the proportion of total buzz or conversation which is ‘Intent’ focused or driven, and thus provides a more indicative measure of the impact of social buzz for our clients business, and takes us one step further than awareness. Way To Blue have devised a bespoke keyword search encompassing a range of natural language keyword sets which represent an audience’s intent to view a movie or engage with a brand, for example “gotta see”’, “can’t wait to see” etc. The keyword set is constantly evolving to account for changing colloquialisms, vernacular & languages across our international work, which social media platforms are often so famous for.” This is measured via a bespoke set of keywords WTB have developed to measure and pick up on Intent related conversation within total conversation.

Just days after its Monday night Sundance Film Festival premiere, Brooklyn has been scooped up for release by Fox Searchlight. Variety reports Searchlight’s $9 million purchase came out on top of a bidding war involving The Weinstein Company, Focus Features and Roadside Attractions. The John Crowley-directed period piece was written by Nick Hornby, adapted from a 2009 novel by Irish writer Colm Tóibín. Saorise Ronan stars in a role that some are already touting as a potential 2016 Oscar contender.

Early reviews of Brooklyn have been mostly strong, with some comparing the film’s mix of comedy, drama and romance against the backdrop of an immigrant’s story to In America. Following young Irish immigrant Eilis Lacey (Ronan) as she navigates 1950’s Brooklyn, finds new love, and is forced to choose between two countries. The Guardian’s Jordan Hoffman wrote, “First half of Brooklyn is just about perfect. Loses considerable steam toward the end, but still good overall.” Tim Grierson of Paste Magazine calls Brooklyn, “The Immigrant meets The New World with the sweetest human beings ever.”

Brooklyn also stars Domnhall Gleeson, Emory Cohen, Jim Broadbent, & Julie Walters, and will likely come to theaters late in 2015. The movie continues to screen through this weekend at Sundance 2015.

Coming-of-age films as well as dystopian movies are quite popular, but combining those genres into a splatter horror-comedy is a more rare type of project. The Park City at Midnight selection has debuted a couple glimpses at their anticipated film, releasing a teaser for the movie and a pretty gory clip to YouTube. Turbo Kid began as as a short film submission to the horror anthology ABCs of Death, but with the help of producer Ant Timpson, writer-directors François Simard, Anouk Whissell, and Yoann-Karl Whissell turned their online short into a Sundance feature.

The upcoming movie takes place in a post-apocalyptic parallel future of 1997, where a maniac and self-proclaimed leader of the Wasteland, Zeus, kidnaps the new love of an orphaned teenager called The Kid. The Kid enlists Frederick, the leader of a “legendary Arm-Wrestling Clan,” to help him, “destroy Zeus, avenge his parents’ death and get the girl of his dreams.”

Turbo Kid teaser trailer

Gory clip from Turbo Kid

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl has already garnered some of the 2015 Sundance Film Festival’s most enthusiastic reviews, but now Fox Searchlight & Indian Paintbrush have made a massive move to acquire the comedy-of-age comedy. Deadline reports a gigantic $12 million deal for the film directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon (although The Wrap’s Jeff Sneider contests it sold for $4.7 million). Following their highly lucrative most recent collaboration The Grand Budapest Hotel, Searchlight & Paintbrush plan to release Me and Earl and the Dying Girl sometime in 2015.

The movie is based on a book of the same name written by the movie’s screenwriter Jesse Andrews. Following a teenage filmmaker with only one friend, Earl, forced by his mother to befriend a girl with leukemia, and was described by Time Out’s David Ehrlich as, “The Fault in Our Stars for Criterion Collection fetishists + an Eno soundtrack”. /Film’s Germain Lussier also praised MAEATDG calling it, “one of those movies you come to #Sundance for. Perfect balance of smart, heart, comedy, drama and film love.”

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl stars Thomas Mann, Olivia Cook, R.J. Cyler with Nick Offerman, Molly Shannon, Jon Bernthal and Connie Britton. Its four remaining screenings at Sundance 2015 are Waitlist only.

The folks over in Park City have just unveiled their lineup for the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, which kicks off the festival season every year in January. With 118 films announced in their lineup, and even more to come over the next couple weeks, there’s a lot of digging to do. Some of the notable standouts so far include: “mumblecore” pioneer Andrew Bujalski’s (Computer Chess) new film Results (starring Guy Pearce, Cobie Smulders and Giovanni Ribisi), Patrick Brice following up this year’s Creep with The Overnight (starring Adam Scott and Jason Schwartzman), Kris Swanberg‘s new film Unexpected, and Compliance director Craig Zobel‘s Z for Zachariah, all of which will compete in the U.S. Dramatic category of the festival. The festival continues to premiere some of the hottest indie titles every year, so check out the entire list below!

The 2015 Sundance Film Festival will take place from Jan 22 – Feb 1.

2015 Sundance Film Festival Lineup

U.S. Dramatic Competition

“Advantageous” (Director: Jennifer Phang, Screenwriters: Jacqueline Kim, Jennifer Phang) — In a near-future city where soaring opulence overshadows economic hardship, Gwen and her daughter, Jules, do all they can to hold on to their joy, despite the instability surfacing in their world. Cast: Jacqueline Kim, James Urbaniak, Freya Adams, Ken Jeong, Jennifer Ehle, Samantha Kim.

“The Bronze” (Director: Bryan Buckley, Screenwriters: Melissa Rauch, Winston Rauch) — In 2004, Hope Ann Greggory became an American hero after winning the bronze medal for the women’s gymnastics team. Today, she’s still living in her small hometown, washed-up and embittered. Stuck in the past, Hope must reassess her life when a promising young gymnast threatens her local celebrity status. Cast: Melissa Rauch, Gary Cole, Thomas Middleditch, Sebastian Stan, Haley Lu Richardson, Cecily Strong. (Day One)

“The D Train” (Directors and screenwriters: Jarrad Paul, Andrew Mogel) — With his 20th reunion looming, Dan can’t shake his high-school insecurities. In a misguided mission to prove he’s changed, Dan rekindles a friendship with the popular guy from his class and is left scrambling to protect more than just his reputation when a wild night takes an unexpected turn. Cast: Jack Black, James Marsden, Kathryn Hahn, Jeffrey Tambor, Mike White, Kyle Bornheimer. 

“The Diary of a Teenage Girl” (Director and screenwriter: Marielle Heller) — Minnie Goetze is a 15-year-old aspiring comic-book artist, coming of age in the haze of the 1970s in San Francisco. Insatiably curious about the world around her, Minnie is a pretty typical teenage girl. Oh, except that she’s sleeping with her mother’s boyfriend. Cast: Bel Powley, Alexander Skarsgard, Christopher Meloni, Kristen Wiig.

“Dope” (Director and screenwriter: Rick Famuyiwa) — Malcolm is carefully surviving life in a tough neighborhood in Los Angeles while juggling college applications, academic interviews, and the SAT. A chance invitation to an underground party leads him into an adventure that could allow him to go from being a geek, to being dope, to ultimately being himself. Cast: Shameik Moore, Tony Revolori, Kiersey Clemons, Blake Anderson, Zoe Kravitz, ASAP Rocky.

“I Smile Back” (Director: Adam Salky, Screenwriters: Amy Koppelman, Paige Dylan) — All is not right in suburbia. Laney Brooks, a wife and mother on the edge, has stopped taking her meds, substituting recreational drugs and the wrong men. With the destruction of her family looming, Laney makes a last, desperate attempt at redemption. Cast: Sarah Silverman, Josh Charles, Thomas Sadoski, Mia Barron, Terry Kinney, Chris Sarandon.

“Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” (Director: Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, Screenwriter: Jesse Andrews) — Greg is coasting through senior year of high school as anonymously as possible, avoiding social interactions like the plague while secretly making spirited, bizarre films with Earl, his only friend. But both his anonymity and friendship threaten to unravel when his mother forces him to befriend a classmate with leukemia. Cast: Thomas Mann, RJ Cyler, Olivia Cooke, Nick Offerman, Connie Britton, Molly Shannon.

“The Overnight” (Director and screenwriter: Patrick Brice) — Alex, Emily, and their son, RJ, are new to Los Angeles. A chance meeting at the park introduces them to the mysterious Kurt, Charlotte and Max. A family “playdate” becomes increasingly interesting as the night goes on. Cast: Adam Scott, Taylor Schilling, Jason Schwartzman, Judith Godreche.

“People, Places, Things” (Director and screenwriter: James C. Strouse) — Will Henry is a newly single graphic novelist balancing being a parent to his young twin daughters and teaching a classroom full of college students, all the while trying to navigate the rich complexities of new love and letting go of the woman who left him. Cast: Jemaine Clement, Regina Hall, Stephanie Allynne, Jessica Williams, Gia Gadsby, Aundrea Gadsby.

“Results” (Director and screenwriter: Andrew Bujalski) — Two mismatched personal trainers’ lives are upended by the actions of a new, wealthy client. Cast: Guy Pearce, Cobie Smulders, Kevin Corrigan, Giovanni Ribisi, Anthony Michael Hall, Brooklyn Decker.

“Songs My Brothers Taught Me” (Director and screenwriter: Chloe Zhao) — This complex portrait of modern-day life on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation explores the bond between a brother and his younger sister, who find themselves on separate paths to rediscovering the meaning of home. Cast: John Reddy, Jashaun St. John, Irene Bedard, Taysha Fuller, Travis Lone Hill, Eleonore Hendricks.

“The Stanford Prison Experiment” (Director: Kyle Patrick Alvarez, Screenwriter: Tim Talbott)— This film is based on the actual events that took place in 1971 when Stanford professor Dr. Philip Zimbardo created what became one of the most shocking and famous social experiments of all time. Cast: Billy Crudup, Ezra Miller, Michael Angarano, Tye Sheridan, Johnny Simmons, Olivia Thirlby.

“Stockholm, Pennsylvania” (Director and screenwriter: Nikole Beckwith — A young woman is returned home to her biological parents after living with her abductor for 17 years. Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Cynthia Nixon, Jason Isaacs, David Warshofsky.

“Unexpected” (Director: Kris Swanberg, Screenwriters: Kris Swanberg, Megan Mercier) — When Samantha Abbott begins her final semester teaching science at a Chicago high school, she faces some unexpected news: She’s pregnant. Soon after, Samantha learns that one of her favorite students, Jasmine, has landed in a similar situation. “Unexpected” follows the two women as they embark on an unlikely friendship. Cast: Cobie Smulders, Anders Holm, Gail Bean, Elizabeth McGovern.

“The Witch” (U.S.-Canada) (Director and screenwriter: Robert Eggers) — New England in the 1630s: William and Katherine lead a devout Christian life with five children, homesteading on the edge of an impassable wilderness. When their newborn son vanishes and crops fail, the family turns on one another. Beyond their worst fears, a supernatural evil lurks in the nearby wood. Cast: Anya Taylor Joy, Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie, Harvey Scrimshaw, Lucas Dawson, Ellie Grainger.

“Z for Zachariah” (Director: Craig Zobel, Screenwriter: Nissar Modi) — In a post-apocalyptic world, a young woman who believes she is the last human on Earth meets a dying scientist searching for survivors. Their relationship becomes tenuous when another survivor appears. As the two men compete for the woman’s affection, their primal urges begin to reveal their true nature. Cast: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Margot Robbie, Chris Pine.

U.S. Documentary Competition

“3 1/2 Minutes” (Director: Marc Silver) — On Nov. 23, 2012, unarmed 17-year-old Jordan Russell Davis was shot at a Jacksonville gas station by Michael David Dunn. “3½ Minutes” explores the aftermath of Jordan’s tragic death, the latent and often unseen effects of racism, and the contradictions of the American criminal justice system.

“Being Evel” (Director: Daniel Junge) — An unprecedented, candid portrait of American icon Robert “Evel” Knievel and his legacy.

“Best of Enemies” (Directors: Morgan Neville, Robert Gordon) — A behind-the-scenes account of the explosive 1968 televised debates between the liberal Gore Vidal and the conservative William F. Buckley Jr., and their rancorous disagreements about politics, God, and sex.

“Call Me Lucky” (Director: Bobcat Goldthwait) — Barry Crimmins was a volatile but brilliant bar comic who became an honored peace activist and influential political satirist. Famous comedians and others build a picture of a man who underwent an incredible transformation.

“Cartel Land” (Director: Matthew Heineman) — In this classic Western set in the 21st century, vigilantes on both sides of the border fight the vicious Mexican drug cartels. With unprecedented access, this character-driven film provokes deep questions about lawlessness, the breakdown of order, and whether citizens should fight violence with violence.

“City of Gold” (Director: Laura Gabbert) — Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Jonathan Gold casts his light upon a vibrant and growing cultural movement in which he plays the dual roles of high-low priest and culinary geographer of his beloved Los Angeles.

“Finders Keepers” (Directors: Bryan Carberry, Clay Tweel) — Recovering addict and amputee John Wood finds himself in a stranger-than-fiction battle to reclaim his mummified leg from Southern entrepreneur Shannon Whisnant, who found it in a grill he bought at an auction and believes it to therefore be his rightful property.

“Hot Girls Wanted” (Directors: Jill Bauer, Ronna Gradus) — A first-ever look at the realities inside the world of the amateur porn industry and the steady stream of 18- and 19-year-old girls entering into it.

“How to Dance in Ohio” (Director: Alexandra Shiva) — In Columbus, Ohio, a group of teenagers and young adults on the autism spectrum prepare for an iconic American rite of passage — a spring formal. They spend 12 weeks practicing their social skills at a local nightclub in preparation for the dance.

“Larry Kramer in Love and Anger” (Director: Jean Carlomusto) — Author, activist, and playwright Larry Kramer is one of the most important and controversial figures in contemporary gay America, a political firebrand who gave voice to the outrage and grief that inspired gay men and lesbians to fight for their lives. At 78, this complicated man still commands our attention.

“Meru” (Directors: Jimmy Chin, E. Chai Vasarhelyi) — Three elite mountain climbers sacrifice everything but their friendship as they struggle through heartbreaking loss and nature’s harshest elements to attempt the never-before-completed Shark’s Fin on Mount Meru, the most coveted first ascent in the dangerous game of Himalayan big wall climbing.

“Racing Extinction” (Director: Louie Psihoyos) — Academy Award winner Louie Psihoyos (“The Cove”) assembles a unique team to show the world never-before-seen images that expose issues surrounding endangered species and mass extinction.

“(T)error” (Directors: Lyric R. Cabral, David Felix Sutcliffe) — The first film to document oncamera a covert counterterrorism sting as it unfolds. Through the perspective of *******, a 63-year-old Black revolutionary turned FBI informant, viewers are given an unprecedented glimpse of the government’s counterterrorism tactics, and the murky justifications behind them.

“Welcome to Leith” (Directors: Michael Beach Nichols, Christopher K. Walker) — A white supremacist attempts to take over a small town in North Dakota.

“Western” (U.S.-Mexico) (Directors: Bill Ross, Turner Ross) — For generations, all that distinguished Eagle Pass, Texas, from Piedras Negras, Mexico, was the Rio Grande. But when darkness descends upon these harmonious border towns, a cowboy and lawman face a new reality that threatens their way of life. Western portrays timeless American figures in the grip of unforgiving change.

“The Wolfpack” (Director: Crystal Moselle) — Six bright teenage brothers have spent their entire lives locked away from society in a Manhattan housing project. All they know of the outside is gleaned from the movies they watch obsessively (and recreate meticulously). Yet as adolescence looms, they dream of escape, ever more urgently, into the beckoning world.

World Cinema Dramatic Competition

“Chlorine” (Italy) (Director: Lamberto Sanfelice, Screenwriters: Lamberto Sanfelice, Elisa Amoruso) — Jenny, 17, dreams of becoming a synchronized swimmer. Family events turn her life upside down and she is forced move to a remote area to look after her ill father and younger brother. It won’t be long before Jenny starts pursuing her dreams again. Cast: Sara Serraiocco, Ivan Franek, Giorgio Colangeli, Anatol Sassi, Piera Degli Esposti, Andrea Vergoni.

“Chorus” (Canada) (Director and screenwriter: Francois Delisle) ­— A separated couple meet again after 10 years when the body of their missing son is found. Amid the guilt of losing a loved one, they hesitantly move toward affirmation of life, acceptance of death, and even the possibility of reconciliation. Cast: Sebastien Ricard, Fanny Mallette, Pierre Curzi, Genevieve Bujold.

“Glassland” (Ireland) (Director and screenwriter: Gerard Barrett) — In a desperate attempt to reunite his broken family, a young taxi driver becomes entangled in the criminal underworld. Cast: Jack Reynor, Toni Collette, Will Poulter, Michael Smiley. (International premiere)

“Homesick” (Norway) (Director: Anne Sewitsky, Screenwriters: Ragnhild Tronvoll, Anne Sewitsky) — When Charlotte, 27, meets her brother Henrik, 35, for the first time, two people who don’t know what a normal family is begin an encounter without boundaries. How does sibling love manifest itself if you have never experienced it before? Cast: Ine Marie Wilmann, Simon J. Berger, Anneke von der Lippe, Silje Storstein, Oddgeir Thune, Kari Onstad.

“Ivy” (Turkey) (Director and screenwriter: Tolga Karacelik) — Sarmasik is sailing to Egypt when the ship’s owner goes bankrupt. The crew learns there is a lien on the ship, and key crew members must stay on board. Ivy is the story of these six men trapped on the ship for days. Cast: Nadir Sarıbacak, Ozgur Emre Yıldırım, Hakan Karsak, Kadir Cermik, Osman Alkaş, Seyithan Ozdemiroglu.

“Partisan” (Australia) (Director: Ariel Kleiman, Screenwriters: Ariel Kleiman, Sarah Cyngler)— Alexander is like any other kid: playful, curious and naive. He is also a trained assassin. Raised in a hidden paradise, Alexander has grown up seeing the world filtered through his father, Gregori. As Alexander begins to think for himself, creeping fears take shape, and Gregori’s idyllic world unravels. Cast: Vincent Cassel, Jeremy Chabriel, Florence Mezzara.

“Princess” (Israel) (Director and screenwriter: Tali Shalom Ezer) — While her mother is away from home, 12-year-old Adar’s role-playing games with her stepfather move into dangerous territory. Seeking an escape, Adar finds Alan, an ethereal boy that accompanies her on a dark journey between reality and fantasy. Cast: Keren Mor, Shira Haas, Ori Pfeffer, Adar Zohar Hanetz. (International premiere)

“The Second Mother” (Brazil) (Director and screenwriter: Anna Muylaert) — Having left her daughter, Jessica, to be raised by relatives in the north of Brazil, Val works as a loving nanny in São Paulo. When Jessica arrives for a visit 13 years later, she confronts her mother’s slave-like attitude and everyone in the house is affected by her unexpected behavior. Cast: Regina Case, Michel Joelsas, Camila Mardila, Karine Teles, Lourenço Mutarelli.

“Slow West” (New Zealand) (Director: John Maclean, Screenwriters: John Maclean, Michael Lesslie) — At the end of the 19th century, 16-year-old Jay Cavendish journeys across the American frontier in search of the woman he loves. He is joined by Silas, a mysterious traveler, and hotly pursued by an outlaw along the way. Cast: Michael Fassbender, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Rory McCann, Ben Mendelsohn, Brooke Williams, Caren Pistorius.

“Strangerland” (Australia-Ireland) (Director: Kim Farrant, Screenwriters: Fiona Seres, Michael Kinirons) — When Catherine and Matthew Parker’s two teenage kids disappear into the remote Australian desert, the couple’s relationship is pushed to the brink as they confront the mystery of their children’s fate. Cast: Nicole Kidman, Joseph Fiennes, Hugo Weaving, Lisa Flanagan, Meyne Wyatt, Maddison Brown.

“The Summer of Sangaile” (Lithuania-France-Holland) (Director and screenwriter: Alante Kavaite) — Seventeen-year-old Sangaile is fascinated by stunt planes. She meets a girl her age at the summer aeronautical show, nearby her parents’ lakeside villa. Sangaile allows Auste to discover her most intimate secret and in the process finds in her teenage love, the only person that truly encourages her to fly. Cast: Julija Steponaityte, Aiste Dirziute. (Day One film)

“Umrika” (India) (Director and screenwriter: Prashant Nair) — When a young village boy discovers that his brother, long believed to be in America, has actually gone missing, he begins to invent letters on his behalf to save their mother from heartbreak, all the while searching for him. Cast: Suraj Sharma, Tony Revolori, Smita Tambe, Adil Hussain, Rajesh Tailang, Prateik Babbar.

World Cinema Documentary Competition

“The Amina Profile” (Canada) (Director: Sophie Deraspe) — During the Arab revolution, a love story between two women — a Canadian and a Syrian American — turns into an international sociopolitical thriller spotlighting media excesses and the thin line between truth and falsehood on the Internet.

“Censored Voices” (Israel-Germany) (Director: Mor Loushy) — One week after the 1967 Six-Day War, renowned author Amos Oz and editor Avraham Shapira recorded intimate conversations with soldiers returning from the battlefield. The Israeli army censored the recordings, allowing only a fragment of the conversations to be published. “Censored Voices” reveals these recordings for the first time.

“The Chinese Mayor” (China) (Director: Hao Zhou) — Mayor Geng Yanbo is determined to transform the coal-mining center of Datong, in China’s Shanxi province, into a tourism haven showcasing clean energy. In order to achieve that, however, he has to relocate 500,000 residences to make way for the restoration of the ancient city.

“Chuck Norris vs. Communism” (U.K.-Romania-Germany) (Director: Ilinca Calugareanu) — In 1980s Romania, thousands of Western films smashed through the Iron Curtain, opening a window to the free world for those who dared to look. A black-market VHS racketeer and courageous female translator brought the magic of film to the masses and sowed the seeds of a revolution.

“Dark Horse” (U.K.) (Director: Louise Osmond) — Dark Horse is the inspirational true story of a group of friends from a workingman’s club who decide to take on the elite “sport of kings” and breed themselves a racehorse.

“Dreamcatcher” (U.K.) (Director: Kim Longinotto) — “Dreamcatcher” takes us into a hidden world seen through the eyes of one of its survivors, Brenda Myers-Powell. A former teenage prostitute, Brenda defied the odds to become a powerful advocate for change in her community. With warmth and humor, Brenda gives hope to those who have none.

“How to Change the World” (U.K.-Canada) (Director: Jerry Rothwell) — In 1971, a group of friends sails into a nuclear test zone, and their protest captures the world’s imagination. Using rare, archival footage that brings their extraordinary world to life, How to Change the World is the story of the pioneers who founded Greenpeace and defined the modern green movement. (Day One film)

“Listen to Me Marlon” (U.K.) (Director and screenwriter: Stevan Riley, Co-writer: Peter Ettedgui) — With exclusive access to previously unheard audio archives, this documentary charts Marlon Brando’s exceptional career and extraordinary life away from the stage and screen, fully exploring the complexities of the man by telling the story uniquely in his own voice.

“Pervert Park” (Sweden-Denmark) (Directors: Frida Barkfors, Lasse Barkfors) — “Pervert Park” follows the everyday lives of sex offenders in a Florida trailer park as they struggle to reintegrate into society, and try to understand who they are and how to break the cycle of sex crimes being committed. (International premiere)

“The Russian Woodpecker” (U.K.) (Director: Chad Gracia) — A Ukrainian victim of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster discovers a dark secret and must decide whether to risk his life by revealing it, amid growing clouds of revolution and war.

“Sembene!” (U.S.-Senegal) (Directors: Samba Gadjigo, Jason Silverman) — In 1952, Ousmane Sembene, a Senegalese dockworker and fifth-grade dropout, began dreaming an impossible dream: to become the storyteller for a new Africa. This true story celebrates how the “father of African cinema,” against enormous odds, fought a monumental, 50-year-long battle to give Africans a voice.

“The Visit” (Denmark-Austria-Ireland-Finland-Norway) (Director: Michael Madsen) — “This film documents an event that has never taken place … ” With unprecedented access to the United Nations’ Office for Outer Space Affairs, leading space scientists and space agencies, “The Visit” explores humans’ first encounter with alien intelligent life and thereby humanity itself. “Our scenario begins with the arrival. Your arrival.”

NEXT

“Bob and the Trees” (U.S.-France) (Director: Diego Ongaro, Screenwriters: Diego Ongaro, Courtney Maum, Sasha Statman-Weil) — Bob, a 50-year-old logger in rural Massachusetts with a soft spot for golf and gangsta rap, is struggling to make ends meet in a changed economy. When his beloved cow is wounded and a job goes awry, Bob begins to heed the instincts of his ever-darkening self. Cast: Bob Tarasuk, Matt Gallagher, Polly MacIntyre, Winthrop Barrett, Nathaniel Gregory. World Premiere

“Christmas, Again” (Director and screenwriter: Charles Poekel) — A heartbroken Christmas tree salesman returns to New York, hoping to put the past year behind him. He spends the season living in a trailer and working the night shift, until a mysterious woman and some colorful customers rescue him from self-destruction. Cast: Kentucker Audley, Hannah Gross, Jason Shelton, Oona Roche. (North American premiere)

“Cronies” (Director and screenwriter: Michael Larnell) — Twenty-two-year-old Louis doesn’t know whether his childhood friendship with Jack will last beyond today. Cast: George Sample III, Zurich Buckner, Brian Kowalski.

“Entertainment” (Director: Rick Alverson, Screenwriters: Rick Alverson, Gregg Turkington, Tim Heidecker) — En route to meeting with his estranged daughter, in an attempt to revive his dwindling career, a broken, aging comedian plays a string of dead-end shows in the Mojave Desert. Cast: Gregg Turkington, John C. Reilly, Tye Sheridan, Michael Cera, Amy Seimetz, Lotte Verbeek.

“H.” (U.S.-Argentina) (Directors and screenwriters: Rania Attieh, Daniel Garcia) — Two women, each named Helen, find their lives spinning out of control after a meteor allegedly explodes over their city of Troy, New York. Cast: Robin Bartlett, Rebecca Dayan, Will Janowitz, Julian Gamble, Roger Robinson.

“James White” (Director and screenwriter: Josh Mond) — A young New Yorker struggles to take control of his reckless, self-destructive behavior in the face of momentous family challenges. Cast: Chris Abbott, Cynthia Nixon, Scott Mescudi, Makenzie Leigh, David Call.

“Nasty Baby” (Director and screenwriter: Sebastian Silva) — A gay couple try to have a baby with the help of their best friend, Polly. The trio navigates the idea of creating life while confronted by unexpected harassment from a neighborhood man called The Bishop. As their clashes grow increasingly aggressive, odds are someone is getting hurt. Cast: Sebastian Silva, Tunde Adebimpe, Kristin Wiig, Reg E. Cathey, Mark Margolis, Denis O’Hare.

“The Strongest Man” (Director and screenwriter: Kenny Riches) — An anxiety-ridden Cuban man who fancies himself the strongest man in the world attempts to recover his most prized possession, a stolen bicycle. On his quest, he finds and loses much more. Cast: Robert Lorie, Paul Chamberlain, Ashly Burch, Patrick Fugit, Lisa Banes.

“Take Me to the River” (Director and screenwriter: Matt Sobel) — A naive California teen plans to remain above the fray at his Nebraskan family reunion, but a strange encounter places him at the center of a long-buried family secret. Cast: Logan Miller, Robin Weigert, Josh Hamilton, Richard Schiff, Ursula Parker, Azura Skye.

“Tangerine” (Director: Sean Baker, Screenwriters: Sean Baker, Chris Bergoch) — A working girl tears through Tinseltown on Christmas Eve searching for the pimp who broke her heart. Cast: Kitana Kiki Rodriguez, Mya Taylor, Karren Karagulian, Mickey O’Hagan, Alla Tumanyan, James Ransone.

“We’re not trash. We’re good people.” These are some of the first words we hear in Tracy Droz Tragos and Andrew Droz Palermo’s Rich Hill. The film, a Grand Jury Prize winner at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, focuses on three adolescents living in Rich Hill, Missouri, a town of just under 1,400. That opening line acts as a sort of thesis for Tragos and Palermo, whose Direct Cinema approach concerns itself with showing their subjects trying to persevere through (mostly financial) problems in their lives. The human qualities of Rich Hill make it a somewhat affective, but disappointingly limited documentary.

The aforementioned statement comes from Andrew, a high-schooler and probably the most balanced of the three subjects. He’s a young and caring kid, affectionately playing with his sisters and taking care of his ill mother. His close bond to his family is most likely due to the fact that it’s hard for him to keep friends; his parents frequently move across the state and country looking for work, yet they always end up back in Rich Hill. His father jumps from one job to the other, trying on different occupations instead of settling on one career. Andrew expresses dissatisfaction with his parents constantly changing locales, but he remains optimistic. “God wanted us to come back here for a reason,” Andrew says as his family moves back to Rich Hill. “I haven’t found it out yet, but I will.”

Appachey is the next subject, a middle schooler with a large amount of developmental issues. His mother Delana lists them off at one point, including ADHD, OCD, ODD and possibly Asperger’s. He carries himself like he’s lived a lot longer than he has, casually smoking a cigarette and telling the camera about his father walking out on him and his family when he was 6. A lot of Appachey’s problems come across as the results of boredom and frustration, as he doesn’t have any idea of what he’d like to do with himself. At one point he considers going to China and becoming an artist, just because he likes the idea of drawing dragons all day. Without any focus or medicinal help (he’s non-compliant, according to Delana) he only has his mother’s tough love to rein him in, but even she’s beginning to lose her patience.

The last subject is Harley, a 15-year-old with the roughest background. His mother’s currently serving a prison sentence, a detail the directors don’t get into until later in the film. Harley faced different traumas while growing up, and shows clear issues with handling his anger. It’s evident that he had a close relationship with his mother before she went to jail, but despite her lack of a presence beyond phone calls and letters Harley tries to live a normal teenage life. Scenes of him going out with friends or dressing up as a Juggalo for Halloween are contrasted with issues about his truancy at school and possibly going to juvenile detention.

Tragos and Palermo don’t take an entirely detached perspective from their subjects, a quality that works in their favour. Most scenes play out with the camera quietly observing, except for a few moments where the teens interact with the crew. Harley shows concern with his hair looking bad on camera, prompting him to put some water in his hair and comb it. While he combs his hair, he warns the camera operator to keep their equipment away if any water gets on it. This kind of moment adds a level of comfort to the film by calling attention to itself, while simultaneously showing Harley for the kind, considerate person he is underneath his angry exterior.

Rich Hill’s subject matter offers plenty of potential areas to explore, but only some are looked at. The town acts as a representative for the small, Midwestern cities across the US dealing with hard economic times. These people are living in extreme poverty. At one point we see Andrew’s family use a coffee maker and an iron to heat water for a bath. These are the kinds of lives where long-term thinking isn’t possible. It’s a world of survival under hard circumstances made by choice or from external, uncontrollable factors.

For a brief moment, Rich Hill brushes with the idea of exploring what it’s like to live a lifestyle where wants don’t exist, as the needs are barely attainable. Delana explains her life story at one point, how she moved out at 17 before marrying and having kids. “I never got to have any dreams or ideals about my life,” she says. “I never had any dreams or hopes.” One of Rich Hill’s most fascinating qualities is watching its subjects, especially the parents, psychologically cope with their lack of financial stability. Andrew’s mother, suffering from an unnamed medical issue, implies she has a dependency on sleeping medication; Andrew’s father refuses to settle anywhere, constantly changing up jobs and locations for the hope of a better life; Delana eventually hands Appachey over to the juvenile detention system, unable to handle things on her own. This information helps paint an interesting picture, but Tragos and Palermo don’t seem too interested in filling in the missing pieces.

The two filmmakers prefer to lean on a more humanistic approach, choosing to back up Andrew’s statement in the opening instead of delving deeper into their subjects’ lives. This method isn’t entirely successful, as Andrew, Appachey and Harley’s stories are all fascinating in their own right, but the overall impact is lacking. There’s no need to prove or highlight these children or their families as “good people” because it’s already there. Breaking through a stereotype to show the person behind it is admirable, but this kind of approach feels overdone given the specific stereotypes being addressed here. It’s disappointing in its simplicity.

Rich Hill still makes for a well-done documentary. With over 450 hours of footage, Editor Jim Hession cuts it down to a well-paced 90 minutes. Andrew Droz Palermo also worked as Director of Photography, with some moments (especially the opening and closing montages of the town) providing great imagery. As Rich Hill closes, Harley talks to the camera before grabbing the bus to school. He tells the crew he’ll see them later as he gets on the bus, but we don’t. The bus drives off, and with a cut to black the documentary starts the standard pre-credit “Where are they now?” title cards. It’s a strong reminder of how, after the film ends, the people in it will continue as they always have, trying to adapt and survive.

Rich Hill trailer

Rose McGowan’s debut short film, Dawn, is a surprisingly original and well-executed revision of a 1950’s teenage romance gone terribly awry. The film opens with our quiet protagonist Dawn sitting in the back seat of a car, getting hassled and badgered by her combative mother and disengaged father. Pulling into a gas station, amidst a brief pause in her mother’s nagging, Dawn turns in time to see a young gas station attendant smiling kindly at her. Charming with his classically American good looks and manner (a sort of cross between Joaquin Phoenix and John Wayne), the film begins with the apparent moral purity of Andy Griffith at Sunday School. Yet when the fated lovers finally meet face to face, the story suddenly takes a much darker turn.

The film is shot in a sort of High Southern Gothic-style, and draws heavily from Flannery O’Connor’s short story A Good Man Is Hard to Find, about a family’s encounter with a well-mannered serial killer in Georgia. Indeed, in a post-screening Q&A session with the director, McGowan stated her original intention was to make a film adaptation of O’Connor’s original text, before the rights were pulled out from underneath her at the last instant. But the upshot of this was perhaps for the better–the film that was produced boasts a strong literary basis yet an original plot line. Dawn makes an interesting parallel to Blue Jasmine, another recent film that makes an adaptation of an older text (in the latter’s case, A Streetcar Named Desire). The works are distinct in-and-of themselves, yet anyone familiar with the earlier texts will make the connections and benefit from an enriched experience of the piece.

Besides these literary aspirations though, McGowan’s film goes well beyond thematic adaptation–her portrait of Dawn as a naïve girl, caught between her own sense of danger and unease and the submissive, “easy going” gender-role that ultimately destroys her, makes for a wickedly dark lesson. This subtext, paired with clever references to the Hollywood culture present at the time, makes for a much more nuanced narrative than one might expect from so a short thriller, ostensibly about teenage love. The film is bitingly ironic, yet still manages to pull it off with tact and ease.

This was a real gem of a short film. Dawn‘s salient literary and cultural references, paired with the film’s high production value, gorgeous shots, its slow-burner buildup and gripping conclusion, bring something to the table for everyone, and portends an excellent directorial career for Ms. McGowan. Something else interesting to know is that McGowan’s first feature length film, a satire about murderous reality show competitors in Miami, is apparently in the pipeline. There’s something I’d keep my eyes open for if I were you.

Today, Magnolia Pictures and Paramount Pictures announced that they will collaborate to bring Joe Swanberg’s Happy Christmas to theaters and home video worldwide.

The film, which premieres at Sundance this Sunday, is written and directed by Swanberg and stars Anna Kendrick, Melanie Lynskey, Mark Webber, Lena Dunham, and Swanberg himself.

Magnolia will be handling US theatrical and VOD distribution, while Paramount will handle US DVD and Blu-ray distribution and all international rights. Magnolia also handled Swanberg’s Drinking Buddies last year.

Here’s the synopsis, via Magnolia/Paramount:

Anna Kendrick plays Jenny, an irresponsible 20-something who comes to Chicago to live with her older brother Jeff (Swanberg), a young filmmaker living a happy existence with his novelist wife Kelly (Lynskey) and their two-year-old son. Jenny’s arrival shakes up their quiet domesticity as she and her friend Carson (Dunham) instigate an evolution in Kelly’s life and career. Meanwhile, Jenny strikes up a rocky relationship with the family’s baby sitter-cum-pot dealer (Webber).

“I’m excited to continue my relationship with the innovative people at Magnolia and to start a new relationship with Paramount,” said Swanberg. “HAPPY CHRISTMAS is a personal and important film for me and I can’t imagine better partners to help connect it with audiences around the world.”

“We’re thrilled to be in business with Joe again on this lovely gem of a film,” said Magnolia President Eamonn Bowles. “Joe’s skill with actors is formidable, and this terrific cast gives wonderful performances all around.”

“We are looking forward to bringing this original, fresh film to home viewing audiences in the U.S. and internationally,” said Syrinthia Studer Senior Vice President, Marketing and Acquisitions, Paramount Home Media Distribution. “HAPPY CHRISTMAS has broad appeal, an exceptional cast and an engaging story that we believe will be well received both here and abroad.”

Magnolia is eyeing a theatrical release in the summer of 2014.

A special preview screening of Richard Linklater’s ambitious new project, Boyhood, has been added to the Sundance 2014 lineup.

The film, also known as the “12 Year Project”, is an unprecedented undertaking: for the past 12 years, Linklater has made one short film a year that follows a boy named Mason (played by Ellar Coltrane), along with his sister Samantha (Lorelei Linklater, the auteur’s daughter), as he navigates the rocky road from boyhood (age 6) to adulthood (age 18).

Coltrane, who began filming in 2000, ages with his character in real time, an idea that, if nothing else, will be visually unlike anything ever seen on film. Playing Coltrane and Linklater’s parents (and aging along with him during the shoot) are Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette. To watch Coltrane physically transform from a tiny tot into a young man within the running time of a feature film, “like timelapse photography of a human being”, as Hawke told The Playlist last year, is a uniquely compelling incentive to keep our eyes on Linklater’s latest.

ABOVE: Linklater in San Francisco, April 2013

This is the auteur’s second project to utilize the real-life passing of time as a storytelling device, following his Before series (whose latest entry, Before Midnight, was my favorite film of 2013), a trio of romance movies separated by 9 years each starring Hawke and Julie Delpy. That series celebrated its 18th birthday last year (a somewhat poetic coincidence). We chatted with Mr. Linklater about the series in an extended interivew last April at the San Francisco International Film Festival.

Linklater has a long-standing relationship with the festival, premiering several of his films there: Before Sunrise (1995), subUrbia 1997, Waking Life (2001), Tape (2001), and Before Midnight (2013).

Boyhood premieres Sunday, January 19th, rounding out the 121 feature-length film lineup. The 2014 Sundance Film Festival runs from January 16th-26th in Park City, Utah.

We spoke to Ahna O’Reilly (The Help) who plays Katie, a girl who meets Oscar by chance, shares a pleasant interaction with him, and later becomes a witness to the horrific shooting in a tiny roundtable interview the day after the film premiered in Oakland. She talked to us about her friendship with The Help and Fruitvale Station costar Octavia Spencer, her first time watching the film with an audience, shooting at the titular train station, and more. Check out the edited transcript below.

Read More Fruitvale Station Interviews:

Ryan Coogler
Michael B. Jordan and Octavia Spencer
Melonie Diaz

How was the premiere?
It was wonderful. I felt more excited for this premiere in Oakland than any one we’ve had.

How familiar were you with the story of Oscar Grant?
Embarrassingly, not enough. I lived in LA at the time it happened, but my parents still lived here. I remember talking about it with them vaguely. One of the things that is most crazy and upsetting about this is that I didn’t have one conversation with people about it in LA. Most people that see this movie, this is the first they’re going to hear of it. One of the main differences between the premiere last night (in Oakland) and the other premieres we’ve had—at Sundance, at Cannes—is that most of those people had no idea who Oscar Grant was. When I’m talking to people about this movie, it’s rarer that they know who Oscar Grant is. That is tragic.

You don’t work with her on the film, but talk about your friendship with Octavia and how she got you involved with the film.
Octavia and I worked together on The Help, but we actually worked together before that. She and I have been friends for years. She’s one of my best friends. I was working on a film in Savannah, Georgia at the time they were shooting Fruitvale Station. She called me and she said, “Can you come be a part of this movie? We need someone to play this part. Please please please?” I was like, “I would do anything for you!” I read the script and I thought, she’s giving me such a huge gift. She’s acting like I’m doing her this huge favor, but she’s just given me such a gift. Being from the Bay Area, to be a part of telling this story, to be working with such an incredible group of artists—it doesn’t get any better.

Is your character is based on anyone?
Ryan told me that [my character] was a combination of a lot of different people. Because it was a combination of people, I didn’t feel I had to base my character on someone 100 percent real. There wasn’t someone I had to go interview. Because this movie came to me so last minute, I was kind of thrown into it. I watched the Youtube footage, I read up on it, but I was kind of thrown into it, which was perfect, because that’s what it was on the train—everyone was just thrown into that dramatic and heart-wrenching and horrible situation. It worked for me to just show up. The grocery store scene is just someone talking to me out of the blue. I actually had no real preparation to do other than I wanted to do my research on Oscar Grant.

Your scene with Oscar in the grocery store goes a long way in showing what kind of a guy Oscar was.
I think the scene is so lovely in that we see Oscar being a great dad, we see him in this moment with this dog, and then we see him having a total random act of kindness with a stranger, and that is such a beautiful trait in him to just want to lend a hand to a community member. Ryan was talking last night about how a lot of what this movie is about is community. I love that little random act of kindness. I think we’re increasingly closed off to the people around us—we’re always on our phone, we’re not looking up and taking people in. That’s what I’m doing in the scene. I’m totally ignoring him, kind of hoping he’s not going to keep talking to me. That’s how I often feel in life, and I have a sense of shame about it. Why didn’t I just say hello to the person helping me out? Why didn’t I just ask them how their day was going? Those little things matter so much. It shows a beautiful side of [Oscar.]

How was it was it watching the movie for the first time with an audience at Sundance?
[It was] incredible. You could hear a pin drop towards the end of the movie. All you heard was people being emotional. [It] didn’t matter—age, sex, race—everyone was shocked. I was a mess. I was sitting next to Michael, gripping him. I knew [the film] would be powerful, but what Ryan did with it really bowled me over. When you have a film going to Sundance, the fact that the film is going to Sundance is exciting, so I was already like, “This is great! We’re here! We made it!” I had no idea [the film] would have the life that it has. I think everyone’s pinching themselves, and it couldn’t happen to a greater group of people who are in this for the purest of reasons—to tell honest, socially relevant stories.

How was it working with Ryan Coogler?
The first scene I shot was the grocery scene, and it was a night shoot. I remember being in [the store] and seeing how he was interacting and talking with everybody and thinking I would literally serve coffee to people on set on his next movie. I want to be around him. He has such a quiet, powerful presence. I think one of the greatest qualities a director can have is finding the balance between being collaborative and wanting to hear everybody’s ideas, but also having a very clear vision. He totally embodied that.

(On the film’s script)
I think it’s brilliant that he started the movie with the real footage. Even if you’ve never heard of Oscar Grant, you know how it ends. The fact that he keeps us glued to the screen, knowing how it’s going to end—that’s an incredible accomplishment.

What was it like filming at Fruitvale Station?
That was one of the most powerful days of work I will probably ever have. On any day of work, you get there and it’s a little chaotic. Who’s going to hair and makeup? Who’s doing what? People are being rushed to where they need to go. Then, we all got [to Fruitvale Station] and it’s like, oh yeah, we’re here. We can see the bullet hole. Ryan took a moment of silence and a prayer circle. It was very, very powerful. Then, you have to get going because you have only until sunlight to make it happen. You’re dealing with a moving train. Those are technically difficult things to have to shoot. It was wild on many levels.

Not all of the train stuff was shot on the same day. The interior train stuff we did down at the Bart repair station. When we were on the Fruitvale Station platform it was a separate shoot.

Why is this film, about such a specific Bay Area community, able to touch people across the world?
I personally wondered how many Europeans watching [the film would know] what Oakland, California is. They know San Francisco, but will they know Oakland? It’s a really American story about a very specific place in our country. You wonder how it will translate [and if] the humor will resonate with them. When [the screening] was over, it got a 10 minute standing ovation. That was incredible. For this [tiny movie]—in terms of budget and scale—[to touch] people from around the world…I’m speechless thinking about it. It’s a universal story. Ryan is asking us, the audience, to think about how we treat each other as human beings. [Can we] erase our ideas about what you are because you’re black or you’re from Oakland or you’re 22 or you were in prison? Can we try to push all that aside and try to look at the heart of this person? People from anywhere should be able to think about that. I think that’s why it succeeds.

The French know about the American South. That’s something people have ideas about. They know about New York, Boston. Oakland? I doubt [it.]

Fruitvale Station opens in theaters this Friday.

Anyone able to withstand the visual and aural assault of The Oregonian will find plenty more to like in Calvin Lee Reeder’s follow-up. Reeder, who tends to prefer a bombardment of surreal imagery over narrative, has a unique style that makes it hard to find any contemporaries similar to him. The closest might be Quentin Dupieux, a director whose bizarre stories have enough self-awareness to make their pointlessness enjoyable. Reeder, on the other hand, seems to take himself too seriously, an issue that sums up everything that’s wrong with The Rambler. It’s not so much singular as it is singularly bad.

The title character (Dermot Mulroney), returning home after a long stint at prison, doesn’t take long to get out of town. His long-term girlfriend (Natasha Lyonne) tells him she’s pregnant with someone else’s child, and the boss at his new job spends most of her time berating him. The man’s brother offers him work at a ranch in Oregon, setting off a cross-country journey that makes no sense whatsoever. The cast of characters Mulroney’s rambler encounters include a doctor whose dream recording machine blows up people’s heads, a taxi driver with a fetish for wounded women, and a romantic interest (Lindsay Pulsipher) who repeatedly dies.

Any attempts to make sense out of The Rambler are a waste of time, as Reeder throws up everything he can think of at the screen that will unsettle viewers. Some of these elements feel derivative on their own, while most of them are amateurish at best. The use of stock sound effects, radio static jump cuts and abundant gore give a cheap, amateur quality to the film that makes it more laughably bad than legitimately disturbing. What The Rambler amounts to is a series of boring vignettes, and when Mulroney’s character predictably abandons his “normal” brother after arriving it turns into an incomprehensible and annoying curiosity.

There’s still something to admire about Reeder’s direction. As bad as it can be, he clearly has a specific vision in mind that he carries out to what appears to be the best of his abilities, even if it fails at what it tries to do. Weirdness for its own sake isn’t a bad thing, but it has to have some sort of entertainment value if it wants to succeed. The Rambler is missing that quality, and as a result it suffers immensely. It’s a head-scratcher of a film, but only in that it’ll have you wondering how it got made in the first place.

Sundance 2013 has come to a close after what seems like an especially strong year. The jury and audience awards were just announced this weekend and the big winner appears to be Fruitvale. The drama, covered in our first Sundance round-up as one of the titles gaining buzz, won the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award for the U.S. Dramatic competition. Last year the Jury award went to Beasts of the Southern Wild while the audience award was given to The Sessions (which was originally titled The Surrogate at Sundance). Both of those movies have gone on to get Oscar nominations, so with Fruitvale we might have an Oscar contender on our hands if it gets released this year. The Weinstein Company has the distribution rights, and while no release date has been given it won’t be surprising if we get to see the film in a prime awards season slot this fall/winter.

Other award winners include: Blood Brother, a documentary about an American volunteering in India which won the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award for Documentaries; Bradford Young, whose work as cinematographer on Ain’t Them Bodies Saints and Mother of George got him the Cinematography Award for both films; Miles Teller and Shailene Woodley earning the Acting Award for their highly praised work in The Spectacular Now; and two of our most anticipated Sundance titles, In A World and Upstream Color, both took home a Writing and Sound Design award respectively.

Full list of 2013 Sundance Film Festival winners below

U. S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic:
Fruitvale

U. S. Grand Jury Prize: Documentary:
Blood Brother

World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic:
Jiseul

World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary:
A River Changes Course

Audience Award: World Cinema Dramatic:
Metro Manila

Audience Award: World Cinema: Documentary:
The Square

Audience Award: U. S. Dramatic presented by Acura:
Fruitvale

Audience Award: U.S. Documentary presented by Acura:
Blood Brother

Audience Award: Best of NEXT:
This is Martin Bonner

Directing Award: U. S. Dramatic:
Afternoon Delight

Directing Award: U. S. Documentary:
Cutie and the Boxer

Directing Award: World Cinema Dramatic:
Crystal Fairy

Directing Award: World Cinema Documentary:
The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear

Cinematography Award: World Cinema Dramatic:
Lasting

Cinematography Award: U. S. Documentary:
Dirty Wars

Cinematography Award: U. S. Dramatic:
Ain’t Them Bodies Saints

Cinematography Award: U. S. Dramatic:
Mother of George

Cinematography Award: World Cinema Documentary:
Who Is Dayani Cristal?

U. S. Documentary Special Jury Award for Achievement in Filmmaking:
Inequality for All

U. S. Documentary Special Jury award for Achievement in Filmmaking:
American Promise

U. S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting:
Miles Teller & Shailene Woodley, The Spectacular Now

U. S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Sound Design:
Shane Carruth & Johnny Marshall, Upstream Color

World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award:
Circles

World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award:
Pussy Riot — A Punk Prayer

Editing Award: World Cinema Documentary:
The Summit

Editing Award: U. S. Documentary:
Gideon’s Army

Screenwriting Award: World Cinema Dramatic:
Wajma (An Afghan Love Story)

Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award: U.S. Dramatic:
In A World…

Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize:
Computer Chess

The 2013 Sundance Film Festival is currently kicking into full-gear over in Park City, Utah and so far there’s been plenty to talk about. We here at Way Too Indie have been following as much information about the films screening so far, and if you’re having a hard time following the festival here’s some of the more major news coming out of Sundance.

Acquisitions

The ultimate goal of every film at Sundance is to get a nice big distribution deal, and so far there have been two examples setting new records for the fest. Don Jon’s Addiction, Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s directorial debut, has scored a huge deal with Relativity Media for $4 million dollars with a $25 million commitment to P&A. The offer is a bold one, especially since the film comes with an R rating and JGL hasn’t proven himself to be a winner at the box office, but Relativity must be confident in the material. The film, a romantic comedy about a sex addict, will most likely get a wide release in the summer.

The other big deal at the festival, and one of the highest ever for Sundance, came from Fox Searchlight. Nat Faxon and Jim Rash’s The Way, Way Back got a whopping $10 million pickup from the studio, but the fact that Searchlight wanted it so bad isn’t too much of a surprise. Faxon and Rash won Best Adapted Screenplay Oscars last year for The Descendants. That film was a box office success for the studio, and The Way, Way Back‘s coming-of-age tale looks to be a crowd pleaser. The film will get a summer release which might be a sign that Searchlight will use a release strategy that’s similar to Beasts of the Southern Wild which also got picked up at Sundance.

Some other interesting acquisitions include:

-The Weinstein Company snagging rights for Fruitvale. The film is a hit with critics (more on that below) so an Oscar push might be in the cards later this year.

-Sony Pictures bought rights for Austenland, a romcom inspired by Jane Austen’s novels. Reviews have been mixed, but Sony Pictures (and more specifically Sony Pictures Classics) have a good track record so it might be better than its gimmicky premise suggests.

-IFC has distribution for Michael Winterbottom’s The Look of Love. Not too shocking that IFC got a deal since they distributed The Trip (Winterbottom and star Steve Coogan’s last collaboration), so expect a platform release on VOD and in theatres sometime soon.

–The Spectacular Now has been gaining buzz for its two main stars, and A24 has already planned to release it in theaters this summer. A24 is a newer distributor but they’ll be in charge of releasing Spring Breakers this year so they must be doing something right.

Buzz

Escape From Tomorrow – It’s a film that flew under everyone’s radar before the festival started, but now that it screened it’s easy to understand why. The film starts with a man finding out he’s been fired on the last day of his family vacation at Disney World, and then proceeds to portray his mind unraveling over the course of the day. The big news item with this movie is that they actually did shoot it at Disney World and Disneyland without Disney’s permission, making critics baffled at how the filmmakers were able to successfully shoot the film without getting into trouble. No one has any clue about what Disney will do, but based on their previous handling of cases it’s likely that this movie will never see the light of day again. Critics have enjoyed the film too, with Indiewire calling it a phantasmagorical nightmare that’s reminiscent of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil. It’s unlikely that any distributor will even get a whiff of this movie, but hopefully there will be a chance to see it one day.

Escape From Tomorrow

Fruitvale – The Weinstein Company’s sale of Fruitvale more or less confirmed that something must be going right for this film. Inspired by the tragic shooting of Oscar Grant during New Year’s Day in 2009, Fruitvale opens with cell phone footage of the incident that took Grant’s life (multiple videos taken at the time showed a cop shooting Grant for no apparent reason; the cop claimed he mistook his taser for his gun and got off with a light sentence sparking a series of protests) before rewinding 12 hours to show the last day of Grant’s life. Oscar winners Octavia Spencer and Forest Whitaker star, but most of the praise has been directed towards Michael B. Jordan’s portrayal of Grant. Jordan is familiar to most people as one of the teens in Chronicle, and The Hollywood Reporter said it will serve as a springboard for Jordan’s career.

Fruitvale

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints – Starring Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck as a couple on the run from the law, David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints has had plenty of terms thrown around including ‘ethereal’, ‘searing’ and getting comparisons to Terrence Malick’s films (specifically Badlands). Lowery’s western will most likely get some sort of distribution deal down the line, but so far it looks like a picturesque and thought-provoking western that’ll be perfect for the arthouse.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints

With 2012 behind us and the Oscars only weeks away, the year in film for 2013 is just about to get underway. Park City, Utah is home to the Sundance Film Festival, a showcase for new independent films in America and (to a lesser degree) the rest of the world. Despite running at the start of the year, Sundance has premiered plenty of films that have eventually gone on to successful runs at the box office and award shows. If you want an example, look no further than last year when Beasts of the Southern Wild premiered to raves and ended up with four Oscar nominations including Best Picture.

So now with Sundance already getting underway, will there be another film ready to ride a wave of success all the way to awards season at the end of the year? Since Way Too Indie won’t be attending the festival this year we won’t be able to see any of the films playing yet, but we’ve gone through the festival line-up and picked the movies we’re most excited to watch. If you want to check things out yourself, the Sundance 2013 line-up can be seen here.

Way Too Indie’s Top 10 Most Anticipated Films Playing Sundance Film Festival 2013

Before Midnight (dir: Richard Linklater, Premieres)
Back in 1995 Richard Linklater released Before Sunrise, a simple but enjoyable film about an American (Ethan Hawke) and a French woman (Julie Delpy) spending the day together in Vienna. Nine years later Linklater, Hawke and Delpy reunited for Before Sunset which found the two characters reuniting in France. Sunset turned out to be one of Linklater’s best movies, and ever since then people have been wondering if a third film would ever get made. Now, nine years after Before Sunset, the three have reunited again for Before Midnight. It remains to be seen whether or not Midnight will live up to the quality of Sunrise and Sunset, but either way it’ll be nice to catch up with Jesse and Celine again. [C.J.]

Before Midnight

Touchy Feely (dir: Lynn Shelton, U.S. Dramatic)
Lynn Shelton is no stranger when it comes to Sundance, Touchy Feely will be her third film in a row that will play at the festival. Her previous film, Your Sister’s Sister, was one of my favorite films of 2012, so I was naturally excited to hear that she would be presenting a new film this year. Back again for a lead role is Rosemarie DeWitt who plays a free-spirited massage therapist but develops a mysterious aversion to bodily contact, which makes her job intolerable to do. Shelton explains that the film is “Literally and figuratively about attempting to live in your own skin.” If it is anything like her previous films, we should expect a film with less script thus more natural feeling dialog, which helps maker her films so genuine. [Dustin]

Touchy Feely

Concussion (dir: Stacie Passon, U.S. Dramatic)
When the line-up was announced I ran through the lists as quick as I could, looking for familiar names and faces, I picked up on the storylines I thought I’d like instantly, and ignored one or two I knew I wouldn’t. Looking through the list again, with personal taste and bias set aside, I noticed quite a few more that had originally got tossed aside. I saw the film still that promoted Concussion on the festival’s programme for U.S. Dramatic and was drawn in to read more. The woman looked exhausted yet beautiful; I read the small description below and was eager to find the About the Director video. Written and directed by Stacie Passon, one of the many female directors amid the Sundance 2013 line-up, the film depicts the life of a married lesbian couple, and primarily focuses on one woman’s struggle of feeling alone, jealous and ultimately sexually abandoned by the person she thought loved her the most – an interesting and diverse storyline. [Amy]

Concussion

Upstream Color (dir: Shane Carruth, U.S. Dramatic)
It has been nearly 10 years since Shane Carruth took Park City by storm with his debut film Primer. Since then his name has barely been mentioned, except for a “special thanks” credit in Looper, until just recently when Sundance made its lineup announcement. Sticking the genre he knows best, Upstream Color looks as if it is another science fiction mind-trip from Carruth. Amy Seimetz plays a woman who has been drugged and brainwashed by a small-time thief. She ends up falling in love with someone who may also be under the same influence. The film has generated a lot of buzz around the internet, making people wonder if he could once again win the Grand Jury Prize. [Dustin]

Upstream Color

I Used To Be Darker (dir: Matt Porterfield, NEXT)
Back in 2010 Matt Porterfield released Putty Hill, a radical and surprisingly powerful film that slowly built up a following of critics who passionately supported it. Shot on an incredibly low budget over 12 days, Putty Hill stood out for its gorgeous cinematography, excellent use of unprofessional actors (including pop singer Sky Ferreira) and unorthodox format that made it feel like a hybrid between documentary and fiction. Two years later Porterfield has returned, this time to a bigger venue, and will hopefully make a bigger name for himself. The story in I Used To Be Darker involves an Irish runaway staying with her American aunt and uncle whose marriage is falling apart. Going by the trailer it looks like Porterfield might have another winner in store. [C.J.]

I Used To Be Darker

Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes (dir: Francesca Gregorini, U.S. Dramatic)
There’s an unintentional theme occurring with my choice of films, being that they’re all directed by women, this one however, is a film that gains greater depth given that the auteur is female. Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes represents the personal story Francesca Gregorini has portrayed through a young female character whose mother died at child birth, therefore leaving her daughter with a missing piece to her life. The director admits that this film is autobiographical as being unable to bare children she relates to the main character’s difficulties and hardship. Francesca Gregorini lays out her feelings and emotions towards loss and despair for the world to witness through this promising, very moving film. [Amy]

Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes

Mud (dir: Jeff Nichols, Spotlight)
Mud opened to a warm reception when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last year, where it was in competition for the esteemed Palme d’Or award. Though Jeff Nichols’ previous thriller Take Shelter was certainly worth a watch, Mud looks like it could be an even more intense thriller than his previous work. The first trailer for the first recently surfaced on the web, just ahead of its U.S. premiere, and it certainly looks promising. Matthew McConaughey appears to have found his niche in playing the “bad guy” role recently, first with Killer Joe and now with this. [Dustin]

Mud

We Are What We Are (dir: Jim Mickle, Midnight)
Anyone who considers themselves a fan of horror films should keep their eye on Jim Mickle. Years ago his debut feature Mulberry Street, about a virus in New York City that turned people into rat-like creatures, was overlooked by people when it got released in After Dark’s “8 Films to Die For” series. Years later Mickle finally started to make a name for himself with Stake Land, an ambitious film about a vampire apocalypse. Now Mickle has returned with We Are What We Are, a dark story about a family trying to keep its horrifying traditions alive. A remake of the 2010 Mexican film with the same title, Mickle has proven himself to be a unique and talented director in the horror genre and we can only hope that his latest movie will continue that trend. [C.J.]

We Are What We Are

In a World (dir: Lake Bell, U.S. Dramatic)
Trying to keep updated with all Sundance news and updates I immediately began following almost all the directors of the official selection on Twitter in search of more information. Lake Bell was one of the later profiles I came across, and now she feels a very familiar personality and a director whose work I am really eager to see. After reading some of her seriously happy, excitable and endearing tweets towards In a World and watching the interview she gave about the film I picked up instantly on her wonderful charm and have high hopes for In a World to surprise Sundance. [Amy]

In a World

Stoker (dir: Park Chan-Wook, Premieres)
Park Chan-Wook is known best for his Vengeance Trilogy, which includes his outstanding film that previously earned him a trip to Sundance, Oldboy. This year he will be bringing his first attempt at an English-language based film, about a woman who is dealing with the recent passing of her father when a mysterious yet charming family member shows up that she has never met before. Soon she starts to suspect this family member may have some ulterior motives. Stoker is said to be a cross between a psychological thriller and a horror film, so with a veteran like Park Chan-Wook at the helm, consider this writer highly intrigued. [Dustin]

Stoker

Other films we are looking forward to

Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s writing and directorial debut Don Jon’s Addiction; George Tillman Jr.’s passion project The Inevitable Defeat of Mister and Pete; teenage drama Very Good Girls; Midnight line-up films including S-VHS (the sequel to V/H/S), Hell Baby, Magic Magic and In Fear; Calvin Reeder’s sure to be divisive The Rambler; Zal Batmanglij and Brit Marling`s follow-up to Sound of My Voice called The East; and Blue Caprice, a drama based on the Beltway sniper attacks. The Sundance film festival officially started today in Park City, Utah and will continue through January 27th.

One day after the Film Independent Spirit Awards announced the nominations for films from the 2012 festival run, Sundance is ready to kick off the festival season for 2013. On Wednesday, Sundance Film Festival announced the Competition Lineups. One day later they presented their Spotlight, Park City At Midnight and New Frontier program lineups which feature out of competition films including some that have already played at other festivals.

Already we are excited about some of the films in the lineup. First and foremost is Touchy Feely from director Lynn Shelton, her follow up to her delightful film from last year, Your Sister’s Sister. Touchy Feely is a drama starring Rosemarie DeWitt (who also starred in Your Sister’s Sister) about a massage therapist that ironically has an aversion to bodily contact. Then we have a long awaited return of Shane Carruth who first turned heads with his 2004 film Primer. Carruth is finally back for his sophomore film entitled Upstream Color.

Two other in competition films that are receiving some more mainstream attention are Kill Your Darlings which will star Daniel Radcliffe, Elizabeth Olson, Ben Foster and Michael C. Hall, about a Columbia murder in 1944 that brought together Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs. David Lowery’s directorial debut Ain’t Them Bodies Saints is also generating buzz. The film is about an outlaw who escapes from prison to reunite with this wife and his child that he has never met.

There are many more films that will be announced to play at Sundance Film Festival to come, this is just the first sets of films. The 2013 Sundance Film Festival will take place from January 17th through the 27th.

U.S. Dramatic Competition

Afternoon Delight (Director and screenwriter: Jill Soloway) — In this sexy, dark comedy, a lost Los Angeles housewife puts her idyllic hipster life in jeopardy when she tries to rescue a stripper by taking her in as a live-in nanny. Cast: Kathryn Hahn, Juno Temple, Josh Radnor, Jane Lynch.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (Director and screenwriter: David Lowery) — The tale of an outlaw who escapes from prison and sets out across the Texas hills to reunite with his wife and the daughter he has never met. Cast: Rooney Mara, Casey Affleck, Ben Foster, Nate Parker, Keith Carradine.

Austenland (Director: Jerusha Hess, Screenwriters: Jerusha Hess, Shannon Hale) — Thirtysomething, single Jane is obsessed with Mr. Darcy, as played by Colin Firth in “Pride and Prejudice.” On a trip to an English resort, her fantasies of meeting the perfect Regency-era gentleman become more real than she ever imagined. Cast: Keri Russell, JJ Feild, Bret McKenzie, Jennifer Coolidge, Georgia King, James Callis.

C.O.G. (Director and screenwriter: Kyle Patrick Alvarez) — In the first film adaptation of David Sedaris’s work, a cocky young man travels to Oregon to work on an apple farm. Out of his element, he finds his lifestyle and notions being picked apart by everyone who crosses his path. Cast: Jonathan Groff, Denis O’Hare, Corey Stoll, Dean Stockwell, Casey Wilson, Troian Bellisario.

Concussion (Director and screenwriter: Stacie Passon) — After a blow to the head, Abby decides she can’t do it anymore. Her life just can’t be only about the house, the kids and the wife. She needs more: she needs to be Eleanor. Cast: Robin Weigert, Maggie Siff, Johnathan Tchaikovsky, Julie Fain Lawrence, Emily Kinney, Laila Robins.

Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes (Director and screenwriter: Francesca Gregorini) — Emanuel, a troubled girl, becomes preoccupied with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to her dead mother. In offering to babysit her newborn, Emanuel unwittingly enters a fragile fictional world, of which she becomes the gatekeeper. Cast: Kaya Scodelario, Jessica Biel, Alfred Molina, Frances O’Connor, Jimmi Simpson, Aneurin Barnard.

Fruitvale (Director and screenwriter: Ryan Coogler) — The true story of Oscar, a 22-year-old Bay Area resident who crosses paths with friends, enemies, family and strangers on the last day of 2008. Cast: Michael B. Jordan, Octavia Spencer, Melonie Diaz, Ahna O’Reilly, Kevin Durand, Chad Michael Murray.

In a World… (Director and screenwriter: Lake Bell) — An underachieving vocal coach is motivated by her father, the king of movie-trailer voice-overs, to pursue her aspirations of becoming a voiceover star. Amid pride, sexism and family dysfunction, she sets out to change the voice of a generation. Cast: Lake Bell, Demetri Martin, Rob Corddry, Michaela Watkins, Ken Marino, Fred Melamed.

Kill Your Darlings (Director: John Krokidas, Screenwriters: Austin Bunn, John Krokidas) — A story of murder that brought together a young Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs at Columbia University in 1944, providing the spark that led to the birth of an entire generation – their Beat revolution. Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Dane DeHann, Ben Foster, Michael C. Hall, Jack Huston, Elizabeth Olsen.

The Lifeguard (Director and screenwriter: Liz W. Garcia) — A former valedictorian quits her job as a reporter in New York and returns to the place she last felt happy: her childhood home in Connecticut. She gets work as a lifeguard and starts a dangerous relationship with a troubled teenager. Cast: Kristen Bell, Mamie Gummer, Martin Starr, Alex Shaffer, Amy Madigan, David Lambert.

May in the Summer (Director and screenwriter: Cherien Dabis) — A bride-to-be is forced to re-evaluate her life when she reunites with her family in Jordan and finds herself confronted with the aftermath of her parents’ divorce. Cast: Cherien Dabis, Hiam Abbass, Bill Pullman, Alia Shawkat, Nadine Malouf, Alexander Siddig.

Mother of George (Director: Andrew Dosunmu, Screenwriter: Darci Picoult) — A story about a woman willing to do anything and risk everything for her marriage. Cast: Isaach De Bankolé, Danai Gurira, Anthony Okungbowa, Yaya Alafia, Bukky Ajayi.

The Spectacular Now (Director: James Ponsoldt, Screenwriters: Scott Neustadter, Michael H. Weber) — Sutter is a high school senior who lives for the moment; Aimee is the introvert he tries to “save.” As their relationship deepens, the lines between right and wrong, friendship and love, and “saving” and corrupting become inextricably blurred. Cast: Miles Teller, Shailene Woodley, Brie Larson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kyle Chandler.

Touchy Feely (Director and screenwriter: Lynn Shelton) — A massage therapist is unable to do her job when stricken with a mysterious and sudden aversion to bodily contact. Meanwhile, her uptight brother’s foundering dental practice receives new life when clients seek out his “healing touch.” Cast: Rosemarie DeWitt, Allison Janney, Ron Livingston, Scoot McNairy, Ellen Page, Josh Pais.

Toy’s House (Director: Jordan Vogt-Roberts, Screenwriter: Chris Galletta) — Three unhappy teenage boys flee to the wilderness, where they build a makeshift house and live off the land as masters of their own destiny. Or at least that’s the plan. Cast: Nick Robinson, Gabriel Basso, Moises Arias, Nick Offerman, Megan Mullally, Alison Brie.

Upstream Color (Director and screenwriter: Shane Carruth) — A man and woman are drawn together, entangled in the life cycle of an ageless organism. Identity becomes an illusion as they struggle to assemble the loose fragments of wrecked lives. Cast: Amy Seimetz, Shane Carruth, Andrew Sensenig, Thiago Martins.

U.S. Documentary Competition

99% — The Occupy Wall Street Collaborative Film (Directors: Audrey Ewell, Aaron Aites, Lucian Read, Nina Kristic) — The Occupy movement erupted in September 2011, propelling economic inequality into the spotlight. In an unprecedented collaboration, filmmakers across America tell its story, digging into issues as organizers, analysts, participants and critics reveal how it happened and why.

After Tiller (Directors: Martha Shane, Lana Wilson) — Since the assassination of Dr. George Tiller in 2009, only four doctors in the country provide late-term abortions. With unprecedented access, “After Tiller” goes inside the lives of these physicians working at the center of the storm.

American Promise (Directors: Joe Brewster, Michèle Stephenson) — This intimate documentary follows the 12-year journey of two African-American families pursuing the promise of opportunity through the education of their sons.

Blackfish (Director: Gabriela Cowperthwaite) — Notorious killer whale Tilikum is responsible for the deaths of three individuals, including a top animal trainer. “Blackfish” shows the sometimes devastating consequences of keeping such intelligent creatures in captivity.

Blood Brother (Director: Steve Hoover) — Rocky went to India as a disillusioned tourist. When he met a group of children with HIV, he decided to stay. He never could have imagined the obstacles he would face, or the love he would find.

Citizen Koch (Directors: Carl Deal, Tia Lessin) — Wisconsin – home of government unions, “cheeseheads” and Paul Ryan – becomes ground zero in the battle for the future of the Republican Party.

Cutie and the Boxer (Director: Zachary Heinzerling) — This candid New York love story explores the chaotic 40-year marriage of boxing painter Ushio Shinohara and his wife, Noriko. Anxious to shed her role as her overbearing husband’s assistant, Noriko finds an identity of her own.

Dirty Wars (Director: Richard Rowley) — Investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill chases down the truth behind America’s covert wars.

Gideon’s Army (Director: Dawn Porter) — This follows three young, committed public defenders who are dedicated to working for the people society would rather forget. Long hours, low pay and staggering caseloads are so common that even the most committed often give up.

God Loves Uganda (Director: Roger Ross Williams) — A powerful exploration of the evangelical campaign to infuse African culture with values imported from America’s Christian right. The film follows American and Ugandan religious leaders fighting “sexual immorality” and missionaries trying to convince Ugandans to follow biblical law.

The Good Life (Directors: Sean Fine, Andrea Nix Fine) — Dr. Leslie Gordon and Dr. Scott Berns fight to save their only son from progeria, a rare and fatal disease for which there is no treatment. In less than a decade, their work has led to significant advances.

Inequality for All (Director: Jacob Kornbluth) — In this timely and entertaining documentary, economic-policy expert Robert Reich distills the topic of widening income inequality, and addresses the question of what effects this increasing gap has on our economy and our democracy.

Manhunt (Director: Greg Barker) — This espionage tale goes inside the CIA’s long conflict against al Qaeda, as revealed by the remarkable women and men whose secret war against Osama bin Laden started nearly a decade before most of us even knew his name.

Narco Cultura (Director: Shaul Schwarz) — An examination of Mexican drug cartels’ influence in pop culture on both sides of the border as experienced by a Los Angeles narcocorrido singer dreaming of stardom and a Juarez crime scene investigator on the front line of Mexico’s drug war.

Twenty Feet From Stardom (Director: Morgan Neville) — Backup singers live in a world that lies just beyond the spotlight. Their voices bring harmony to the biggest bands in popular music, but we’ve had no idea who these singers are or what lives they lead – until now.

Valentine Road (Director: Marta Cunningham) — In 2008, eighth-grader Brandon McInerney shot classmate Larry King at point-blank range. Unraveling this tragedy, the film reveals the heartbreaking circumstances that led to the shocking crime as well as its startling aftermath.

World Cinema Dramatic Competition

Circles/Serbia, Germany, France, Croatia, Slovenia (Director: Srdan Golubovic, Screenwriters: Srdjan Koljevic, Melina Pota Koljevic) — Five people are affected by a tragic heroic act. Twenty years later, all of them will confront the past through their own crises. Will they overcome guilt, frustration and their urge for revenge? Will they do the right thing? Cast: Aleksandar Bercek, Leon Lucev, Nebojsa Glogovac, Hristina Popovic, Nikola Rakocevic, Vuk Kostic.

Crystal Fairy/Chile (Director and screenwriter: Sebastián Silva) — Jamie invites a stranger to join a road trip to Chile. The woman’s free and esoteric nature clashes with Jamie’s acidic, self-absorbed personality as they head into the desert for a mescaline-fueled psychedelic trip. Cast: Michael Cera, Gabby Hoffmann, Juan Andrés Silva, José Miguel Silva, Agustín Silva.

The Future/Chile, Germany, Italy, Spain (Director and screenwriter: Alicia Scherson) — When their parents die, Bianca starts to smoke and Tomas is still a virgin. The orphans explore the dangerous streets of adulthood until Bianca finds Maciste, a retired Mr. Universe, and enters his dark mansion in search of a future. Cast: Manuela Martelli, Rutger Hauer, Luigi Ciardo, Nicolas Vaporidis, Alessandro Giallocosta.

Houston/Germany (Director and screenwriter: Bastian Günther) — Clemens Trunschka is a corporate headhunter and an alcoholic. Drinking increasingly isolates him and leads him away from reality. While searching for a chief executive candidate in Houston, his addiction submerges him in darkness. Cast: Ulrich Tukur, Garret Dillahunt, Wolfram Koch, Jenny Schily, Jason Douglas, Jens Münchow.

Jiseul/South Korea (Director and screenwriter: Muel O) — In 1948, as the Korean government ordered the Communists’ eviction to Jeju Island, the military invaded a peaceful village. Townsfolk took sanctuary in a cave and debated moving to a higher mountain. Cast: Min-chul Sung, Jung-won Yang, Young-soon Oh, Soon-dong Park, Suk-bum Moon, Kyung-sub Jang.

Lasting/Poland, Spain (Director and screenwriter: Jacek Borcuch) — An emotional love story about two Polish students who fall in love with each other while working summer jobs in Spain. An unexpected nightmare interrupts their carefree time in the heavenly landscape and throws their lives into chaos. Cast: Jakub Gierszal, Magdalena Berus, Angela Molina.

Metro Manila/United Kingdom, Philippines (Director: Sean Ellis, Screenwriters: Sean Ellis, Frank E. Flowers) — Seeking a better life, Oscar and his family move from the poverty-stricken rice fields to the big city of Manila, where they fall victim to various inhabitants whose manipulative ways are a daily part of city survival. Cast: Jake Macapagal, John Arcilla, Althea Vega.

Shopping/New Zealand (Directors: Mark Albiston, Louis Sutherland, Screenwriters: Louis Sutherland, Mark Albiston) — New Zealand, 1981: Seduced by a charismatic career criminal, teenager Willie must choose where his loyalty lies – with a family of shoplifters or his own blood. Cast: Kevin Paulo, Julian Dennison, Jacek Koman, Alistair Browning.

Soldate Jeannette/Austria (Director: Daniel Hoesl) — Fanni has had enough of money and leaves to buy a tent. Anna has had enough of pigs and leaves a needle in the hay. Cars crash and money burns to shape their mutual journey toward a rising liberty. Cast: Johanna Orsini-Rosenberg, Christina Reichsthaler, Josef Kleindienst, Aurelia Burckhardt, Julia Schranz, Ines Rössl.

There Will Come a Day/Italy, France (Director: Giorgio Diritti, Screenwriters: Giorgio Diritti, Fredo Valla, Tania Pedroni) — Painful issues push Augusta, a young Italian woman, to doubt the certainties on which she has built her existence. On a small boat in the Amazon rain forest, she faces the adventure of searching for herself. Cast: Jasmine Trinca, Anne Alvaro, Pia Engleberth.

Wajma (An Afghan Love Story)/Afghanistan (Director and screenwriter: Barmak Akram) — A young man in Kabul seduces a girl. When she tells him she’s pregnant, he questions having taken her virginity. Then her father arrives, and a timeless, archaic violence erupts – possibly leading to a crime, and even a sacrifice. Cast: Wajma Bahar, Mustafa Abdulsatar, Haji Gul, Breshna Bahar.

What They Don’t Talk About When They Talk About Love/Indonesia (Director and screenwriter: Mouly Surya) — This film explores the odds of love and deception among the blind, the deaf and the unlucky sighted people at a high school for the visually impaired. Cast: Nicholas Saputra, Ayushita Nugraha, Karina Salim, Anggun Priambodo, Lupita Jennifer.

World Cinema Documentary Competition

Fallen City/China (Director: Qi Zhao) — This spans four years to reveal how three families who survived the 2008 Sichuan earthquake embark on a journey in search of hope, purpose, identity and new lives in a China torn between tradition and modernity.

Fire in the Blood/India (Director: Dylan Mohan Gray) — In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Western governments and pharmaceutical companies blocked low-cost antiretroviral drugs from reaching AIDS-stricken Africa, leading to 10 million or more unnecessary deaths. An improbable group of people decided to fight back.

Google and the World Brain/Spain, United Kingdom (Director: Ben Lewis) — In the most ambitious project ever conceived on the Internet, Google has been scanning the world’s books for 10 years. It said the intention was to build a giant digital library, but that involved scanning millions of copyrighted works.

The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear/Georgia, Germany (Director: Tinatin Gurchiani) — A film director casting a 15-to-23-year-old protagonist visits villages and cities to meet people who answer her call. She follows those who prove to be interesting enough through various dramatic and funny situations.

The Moo Man/United Kingdom (Directors: Andy Heathcote, Heike Bachelier) — A year in the life of heroic farmer Steve, scene-stealing Ida (queen of the herd) and a supporting cast of 55 cows. When Ida falls ill, Steve’s optimism is challenged and their way of life is at stake.

Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer/Russian Federation, United Kingdom (Directors: Mike Lerner, Maxim Pozdorovkin) — Three young women face seven years in a Russian prison for a satirical performance in a Moscow cathedral. But who is really on trial: the three young artists or the society they live in?

A River Changes Course/Cambodia, U.S.A. (Director: Kalyanee Mam) — Three young Cambodians struggle to overcome the crushing effects of deforestation, overfishing and overwhelming debt in this devastatingly beautiful story of a country reeling from the tragedies of war and rushing to keep pace with a rapidly expanding world.

Salma/United Kingdom, India (Director: Kim Longinotto) — When Salma, a young girl in South India, reached puberty, her parents locked her away. Millions of girls all over the world share the same fate. Twenty-five years later, Salma has fought her way back to the outside world.

The Square (El Midan)/Egypt, U.S.A. (Director: Jehane Noujaim) — What does it mean to risk your life for your ideals? How far will five revolutionaries go in defending their beliefs in the fight for their nation?

The Stuart Hall Project/United Kingdom (Director: John Akomfrah) — Antinuclear campaigner, New Left activist and founding father of cultural studies. This documentary interweaves 70 years of Stuart Hall’s film, radio and television appearances, and material from his private archive to document a memorable life and construct a portrait of Britain’s foremost radical intellectual.

The Summit/Ireland, United Kingdom (Director: Nick Ryan) — 24 climbers converged at the last stop before summiting the most dangerous mountain on Earth. Forty-eight hours later, 11 had been killed or simply vanished. Had one, Ger McDonnell, stuck to the climbers’ code, he might still be alive.

Who Is Dayani Cristal?/United Kingdom (Director: Marc Silver) — An anonymous body in the Arizona desert sparks the beginning of a real-life human drama. The search for its identity leads us across a continent to seek out the people left behind and the meaning of a mysterious tattoo.

Next

Blue Caprice (Director: Alexandre Moors, Screenwriters: R.F.I Porto, Alexandre Moors) — An abandoned boy is lured to America and drawn into the shadow of a dangerous father figure in this film inspired by the real-life events that led to the 2002 Beltway sniper attacks. Cast: Isaiah Washington, Tequan Richmond, Joey Lauren Adams, Tim Blake Nelson, Cassandra Freeman, Leo Fitzpatrick.

Computer Chess (Director and screenwriter: Andrew Bujalski) — An existential comedy about the brilliant men who taught machines to play chess, back when the machines seemed clumsy and we seemed smart. Cast: Patrick Riester, Myles Paige, James Curry, Robin Schwartz, Gerald Peary, Wiley Wiggins.

Escape From Tomorrow (Director and screenwriter: Randy Moore) — A postmodern, surreal voyage into the bowels of “family” entertainment. An epic battle begins when an unemployed, middle-aged father loses his sanity during a close encounter with two teenage girls on holiday. Cast: Roy Abramsohn, Elena Schuber, Katelynn Rodriguez, Annet Mahendru, Danielle Safady, Alison Lees-Taylor.

I Used to Be Darker (Director: Matthew Porterfield, Screenwriters: Amy Belk, Matthew Porterfield) — A runaway seeks refuge with her aunt and uncle in Baltimore, only to find their marriage ending and her cousin in crisis. In the days that follow, the family struggles to let go while searching for things to sustain them. Cast: Deragh Campbell, Hannah Gross, Kim Taylor, Ned Oldham, Geoff Grace, Nick Petr.

It Felt Like Love (Director and screenwriter: Eliza Hittman) — On the outskirts of Brooklyn, a 14-year-old girl’s sexual quest takes a dangerous turn when she pursues an older guy and tests the boundaries between obsession and love. Cast: Gina Piersanti, Giovanna Salimeni, Ronen Rubinstein, Jesse Cordasco, Nick Rosen, Case Prime.

Milkshake (Director: David Andalman, Screenwriters: David Andalman, Mariko Munro) — In mid-1990s America, we follow the tragic sex life of Jolie Jolson, a wannabe thug (and great-great-grandson of legendary vaudevillian Al Jolson) in suburban Washington as he strives to become something he can never be – black. Cast: Tyler Ross, Shareeka Epps, Georgia Ford, Eshan Bay, Leo Fitzpatrick, Danny Burstein.

Newlyweeds (Director and screenwriter: Shaka King) — A Brooklyn repo man and his globetrotting girlfriend forge an unlikely romance. But what should be a match made in stoner heaven turns into a love triangle gone awry in this dark coming-of-age comedy about dependency. Cast: Amari Cheatom, Trae Harris, Tone Tank, Colman Domingo, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Adrian Martinez.

Pit Stop (Director: Yen Tan, Screenwriters: Yen Tan, David Lowery) — Two working-class gay men in a small Texas town and a love that isn’t quite out of reach. Cast: Bill Heck, Marcus DeAnda, Amy Seimetz, John Merriman, Alfredo Maduro, Corby Sullivan.

A Teacher (Director and screenwriter: Hannah Fidell) — A popular young teacher in a wealthy suburban Texas high school has an affair with one of her students. Her life begins to unravel as the relationship comes to an end. Cast: Lindsay Burdge, Will Brittain, Jennifer Prediger, Jonny Mars, Julie Phillips, Chris Dubeck.

This Is Martin Bonner (Director and screenwriter: Chad Hartigan) — Martin Bonner has just moved to Reno for a new job in prison rehabilitation. Starting over at 58, he struggles to adapt until an unlikely friendship with an ex-con blossoms, helping him confront the problems he left behind. Cast: Paul Eenhoorn, Richmond Arquette, Sam Buchanan, Robert Longstreet, Demetrius Grosse.

Spotlight

Fill the Void / Israel (Director and screenwriter: Rama Burshtein) — A devout 18-year-old Israeli is pressured to marry the husband of her late sister. Declaring her independence is not an option in Tel Aviv’s ultra-Orthodox Hasidic community, where religious law, tradition and the rabbi’s word are absolute. Cast: Hadas Yaron, Yiftach Klein, Irit Sheleg, Chaim Sharir, Razia Israeli, Hila Feldman.

Gangs of Wasseypur / India (Director: Anurag Kashyap, Screenwriters: Anurag Kashyap, Zeishan Quadri) — Exiled and outcast for robbing British trains, Shahid Khan spurs a battle for revenge that passes down generations. Shahid’s son vows to get his father’s honor back, becoming the most feared man in the Indian town of Wasseypur. Cast: Manoj Bajpai, Nawazuddin Siddique, Richa Chadda, Huma Qureshi, Tigmanshu Dhulia.

The Gatekeepers (documentary) / Israel, Germany, Belgium, France (Director: Dror Moreh) — Since its stunning military victory in 1967, Israel has hoped to achieve a long-lasting peace. Forty-five years later, this has yet to happen. Six former heads of Israel’s Secret Service reflect on the successes and failures of the “peace process.”

Mud / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Jeff Nichols) — Two teenage boys encounter a fugitive and form a pact to help him evade the bounty hunters on his trail and reunite him with his true love. Cast: Matthew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland, Reese Witherspoon. North American Premiere

No / Chile, U.S.A. (Director: Pablo Larraín, Screenwriter: Pedro Peirano) — When Chilean military dictator Augusto Pinochet calls for a referendum to decide his permanence in power, the opposition persuades a young advertising executive to head its campaign. With limited resources and under scrutiny, he conceives a plan to win the election. Cast: Gael García Bernal, Alfredo Castro, Antonia Zegers, Luis Gnecco, Marcial Tagle, Néstor Cantillana.

Sightseers / United Kingdom (Director: Ben Wheatley, Screenwriters: Alice Lowe, Steve Oram) — Chris wants to show girlfriend Tina his world, but when events conspire against the couple, their dream caravan holiday takes a very wrong turn. Cast: Alice Lowe, Steve Oram. U.S. Premiere

Stories We Tell (documentary) / Canada (Director: Sarah Polley) — Sarah Polley is both filmmaker and detective as she investigates the secrets kept by a family of storytellers. She unravels the paradoxes to reveal the essence of family: always complicated, warmly messy and fiercely loving.

Park City At Midnight

Ass Backwards / U.S.A. (Director: Chris Nelson, Screenwriters: June Diane Raphael, Casey Wilson) — Loveable losers Kate and Chloe take a road trip back to their hometown to claim the beauty pageant crown that eluded them as children, only to discover what really counts: friendship. Cast: June Diane Raphael, Casey Wilson, Vincent D’Onofrio, Alicia Silverstone, Jon Cryer, Brian Geraghty.

Hell Baby / U.S.A. (Directors and screenwriters: Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon) — An expectant couple moves into the most haunted fixer-upper in New Orleans – a house with a demonic curse. Things spiral out of control and soon only the Vatican’s elite exorcism team can save the pair – or can it? Cast: Rob Corddry, Leslie Bibb, Keegan Michael Key, Riki Lindhome, Paul Scheer, Rob Huebel.

In Fear / United Kingdom (Directed and story by: Jeremy Lovering) — Trapped in a maze of country roads with only their vehicle for protection, Tom and Lucy are terrorized by an unseen tormentor exploiting their worst fears. Eventually they realize they’ve let the evil in – it’s sitting in their car. Cast: Alice Englert, Iain De Caestecker, Allen Leech.

kink (documentary) / U.S.A. (Director: Christina Voros) — A story of sex, submission and big business is told through the eyes of the unlikely pornographers whose 9:00-to-5:00 work days are spent within the confines of the San Francisco Armory building, home to the sprawling porn production facilities of Kink.com.

The Rambler / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Calvin Lee Reeder) — After being released from prison, a man known as “The Rambler” stumbles upon a strange mystery as he attempts the treacherous journey through back roads and small towns en route to reconnecting with his long-lost brother. Cast: Dermot Mulroney, Lindsay Pulsipher, Natasha Lyonne, James Cady, Scott Sharot.

S-VHS / U.S.A., Canada (Directors: Simon Barrett, Adam Wingard, Edúardo Sanchez, Gregg Hale, Timo Tjahjanto, Gareth Huw Evans, Jason Eisener, Screenwriters: Simon Barrett, Jamie Nash, Timo Tjahjanto & Gareth Huw Evans, John Davies) — Searching for a missing student, two private investigators break into his abandoned house and find another collection of mysterious VHS tapes. In viewing the horrific contents of each cassette, they realize there may be terrifying motives behind the student’s disappearance. Cast: Adam Wingard, Lawrence Levine, L.C Holt, Kelsy Abbott, Hannah Hughes.

Virtually Heroes / U.S.A. (Director: GJ Echternkamp, Screenwriter: Matt Yamashita) — Two self-aware characters in a Call of Duty-style video game struggle with their screwy, frustrating existence. To find answers, one abandons his partner and mission, seeking to unravel the cheat codes of life. Cast: Robert Baker, Brent Chase, Katie Savoy, Mark Hamill, Ben Messmer.

We Are What We Are / U.S.A. (Director: Jim Mickle, Screenwriters: Nick Damici, Jim Mickle) — A devastating storm washes up clues that lead authorities closer and closer to the cannibalistic Parker family. Cast: Bill Sage, Ambyr Childers, Julia Garner, Michael Parks, Wyatt Russell, Kelly McGillis.

New Frontier

Charlie Victor Romeo / U.S.A. (Directors: Robert Berger, Karlyn Michelson, Screenwriters: Robert Berger, Patrick Daniels, Irving Gregory) — An award-winning theatrical documentary derived entirely from ‘Black Box’ transcripts of six real-life major airline emergencies brought to the screen with cutting-edge stereoscopic 3D technology. Cast: Patrick Daniels, Irving Gregory, Noel Dinneen, Sam Zuckerman, Debbie Troche, Nora Woolley.

Fat Shaker / Iran (Director and screenwriter: M Shirvani) — An obese father and his handsome, deaf son share extraordinary experiences in Tehran. Then a beautiful young woman upsets the balance of their relationship, forcing them to renegotiate their position with each other and the world around them. Cast: Levon Haftvan, Maryam Palizban, Hassan Rostami, Navid Mohammadzadeh.

Halley / Mexico (Director: Sebastian Hofmann, Screenwriters: Sebastian Hofmann, Julio Chavezmontes) — Alberto is dead and can no longer hide it. Before surrendering to his living death, he forms an unusual friendship with Luly, the manager of the 24-hour gym where he works as a night guard. Cast: Alberto Trujillo, Lourdes Trueba, Hugo Albores.

Interior. Leather Bar. / U.S.A. (Directors: Travis Mathews, James Franco, Screenwriter: Travis Mathews) — To avoid an X rating, it was rumored that 40 minutes of gay S&M footage was cut from the controversial 1980 film, Cruising. Filmmakers James Franco and Travis Mathews re-imagine what was in the lost footage. Cast: Val Lauren, James Franco, Travis Mathews, Christian Patrick, Brenden Gregory.

The Meteor / Canada (Director: François Delisle, Screenwriter: François Delisle) — Forty-something Pierre, his mother and his wife are linked by crime, guilt and loneliness. Like casualties of love and desire, they are dying to stick their heads above water and breathe the air of life. Cast: Noémie Godin Vigneau, François Delisle, Laurent Lucas, Brigitte Pogonat, François Papineau, Andrée Lachapelle.

The 2012 Sundance Film Festival winners have been announced by the juries tonight in Park City, Utah. Beasts of the Southern Wild picked up two wins for Grand Jury Prize Dramatic and cinematography. Fox Searchlight’s other acquisition, The Surrogate, also won two awards at the festival.

Full list of 2012 Sundance Film Festival winners:

Grand Jury Prize, Dramatic:
Beasts of the Southern Wild

Grand Jury Prize, Documentary:
The House I Live In

World Cinema Jury Prize, Dramatic:
Violeta Went To Heaven

World Cinema Jury Prize, Documentary:
The Law In These Parts

Dramatic Audience Award:
The Surrogate

Documentary Audience Award:
The Invisible War

World Cinema Dramatic Audience Award:
Valley of Saints

World Cinema Documentary Audience Award:
Searching For Sugar Man

The Best of NEXT Audience Award:
Sleepwalk With Me

Directing Award, Dramatic:
Ava DuVernay, Middle of Nowhere

Directing Award, Documentary:
Lauren Greenfield, The Queen of Versailles

World Cinema Directing Award, Dramatic:
Mads Matthiessen, Teddy Bear

World Cinema Directing Award, Documentary:
Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi, 5 Broken Cameras

Waldo Scott Screenwriting Award:
Safety Not Guaranteed

World Cinema Screenwriting Award:
Young & Wild

Documentary Editing Award:
Detropia

World Cinema Documentary Editing Award:
Indie Game: The Movie

Excellence in Cinematography Award, Dramatic:
Beasts of the Southern Wild

Excellence in Cinematography Award, Documentary:
Chasing Ice

World Cinema Cinematography Award, Dramatic:
My Brother The Devil

World Cinema Cinematography Award, Documentary:
Putin’s Kiss

Special Jury Prize: Dramatic (Acting):
The cast of The Surrogate

Special Jury Prize: Dramatic:
Jonathan Schwartz and Andrea Sperling for producing Smashed and Nobody Walks

Special Jury Prizes: Documentary:
Love Free or Die
Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry

World Cinema Special Jury Prize: Documentary
Searching For Sugar Man

World Cinema Special Jury Prize: Dramatic
Can

Alfred P. Sloan Prizes
Robot & Frank
Valley of Saints

Sundance/NHK International Filmmakers Award:
Jens Assur, Close Far Away

Short Film Audience Award:
The Debutante Hunters, directed by Maria White

There were a few films that received multiple awards at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. Drake Doremus’ Like Crazy won the Grand Jury Prize for Dramatic as well as a special jury prize for acting by Felicity Jones. Mike Cahill’s Another Earth received two awards, one for special jury prize for dramatic competition and the Alfred P. Sloan prize. Paddy Considine’s Tyrannosaur also walked away with two awards.

Full list of 2011 Sundance Film Festival winners:

Grand Jury Prize, Dramatic:
Like Crazy

Grand Jury Prize, Documentary:
How To Die In Oregon

World Cinema Jury Prize, Dramatic:
Happy, Happy

World Cinema Jury Prize, Documentary:
Hell and Back Again

Dramatic Audience Award:
Circumstance

Documentary Audience Award:
Buck

World Cinema Dramatic Audience Award:
Kinyarwanda

World Cinema Documentary Audience Award:
Senna

The Best of NEXT Audience Award:
to.get.her

Directing Award, Dramatic:
Sean Durkin, Martha Marcy May Marlene

Directing Award, Documentary:
Jon Foy, Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles

World Cinema Directing Award, Dramatic:
Paddy Considine, Tyrannosaur

World Cinema Directing Award, Documentary:
James Marsh, Project Nim

Waldo Scott Screenwriting Award:
Another Happy Day

World Cinema Screenwriting Award:
Restoration

Documentary Editing Award:
If a Tree Falls

World Cinema Documentary Editing Award:
The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975

Excellence in Cinematography Award, Dramatic:
Pariah

Excellence in Cinematography Award, Documentary:
The Redemption of General Butt Naked

World Cinema Cinematography Award, Dramatic:
All Your Dead Ones

World Cinema Cinematography Award, Documentary:
Hell and Back Again

Special Jury Prize: Dramatic (Acting):
Felicity Jones, Like Crazy

Special Jury Prize: Dramatic:
Another Earth

Special Jury Prize: Documentary:
Being Elmo

World Cinema Special Jury Prize: Documentary
Position Among The Stars

World Cinema Special Jury Prize: Dramatic
Tyrannosaur

Alfred P. Sloan Prizes
Another Earth

Sundance/NHK International Filmmakers Award:
Cherien Dabis