In 1989, a then nascent Sundance Movie Competition launched Steven Soderbergh to cinephiles with an earthquake of a debut, Intercourse, Lies, and Videotape. He’s certainly one of dozens of iconic administrators who received their begin in Park Metropolis—and certainly one of a handful making their return to Utah this January for the pageant’s milestone fortieth version, whose lineup was launched on Tuesday. The Oscar winner is returning with, naturally, a secret film that hadn’t been formally introduced till now, the ghost story Presence, starring Lucy Liu and Julia Fox. “It’s a extremely terrific movie,” pageant director Eugene Hernandez teases to Vainness Honest. “It resonated instantly with our complete workforce and it’s such a enjoyable movie to debate.”
This marks Hernandez’s first yr with Sundance, after spending greater than a decade with the New York Movie Competition. He and the workforce waded by greater than 17,000 submissions, a report quantity, and are making their mark with an anniversary yr at a pivotal turning level within the business, with the festival-sales local weather quieting and the way forward for specialty theatrical releases in flux. They’ve additionally scaled again digital choices that had been pioneered within the aftermath of COVID whereas nonetheless cementing their presence. As for honoring Sundance’s 40 years, Soderbergh might be joined by fellow famous alums Richard Linklater, Lana Wilson, Daybreak Porter, and extra in showcasing new work.
Going ahead, Hernandez is bringing a transparent perspective to his—and Sundance’s—position as a significant assembly floor for international unbiased movie. “It’s a chance for us to shine a light-weight and to show the highlight on these artists, these filmmakers that we’ve chosen from that vast variety of submissions,” he says. “In speaking with the business the final variety of days, they’re able to dig in, to seek out new movies, to find new artists. Brokers are in search of shoppers to characterize. The business is coming again after these strikes, so there’s a starvation, and I’m listening to it from all sectors—to reengage and to actually present up at Sundance.”
The expertise pool might be important—maybe, above all, on the manufacturing facet. Within the Premieres part, Margot Robbie, recent off of huge behind-the-scenes successes with Barbie and Saltburn, backs My Outdated Ass, a psychedelic coming-of-age story starring Maisy Stella, whereas Jesse Eisenberg each produces and stars in Sasquatch Sundown, a Bleecker Avenue launch additionally starring Riley Keough whose plot is being stored beneath wraps. (Eisenberg will play double responsibility in Park Metropolis this yr, as his subsequent film as a director, Actual Ache, will display within the US dramatic-competition part.) There’s additionally Will & Harper, a captivating documentary that Will Ferrell produces a few street journey he takes along with his good friend of greater than 30 years, Harper Steele, after she comes out as a trans girl. “It’s a private movie for Will…and never solely an emotional experience for each Will and Harper, however I believe for an viewers,” says director of programming Kim Yutani. “We had been deeply moved by this movie.”
Within the form-bending Subsequent part, Darren Aronofsky backs Little Dying, a twisty portrait of a filmmaker performed by David Schwimmer, whereas over in Midnights, Emma Stone produces I Noticed the TV Glow, an ingenious supernatural movie going down on the earth of late-night TV and starring Justice Smith. It’s an A24 launch, and the indie studio has one other buzzy title again within the Premieres part, the wild Sebastian Stan automobile A Totally different Man; different main specialty studios like Searchlight Footage and Focus Options are additionally represented right here—regardless of the Sundance program comprising roughly 80% acquisition titles. “How can we assist launch a movie {that a} studio has taken an opportunity on with a first-time filmmaker, and the way can we assist these movies get seen by bigger audiences?” Yutani says of the pondering there, earlier than highlighting Searchlight’s Suncoast starring Woody Harrelson and Laura Linney. “That’s an extremely private movie for the filmmaker, Laura Chinn.” The workforce can also be excessive on Focus’s The American Society of Magical Negroes, a debut from Sundance Labs alum Kobi Libii. “It’s going to play actually, rather well,” Hernandez teases.
Final yr’s Sundance fielded business and important successes like Previous Lives, Passages, and The Everlasting Reminiscence. Discovery is what the pageant has all the time been and stays about, going again to Soderbergh’s splashy debut and even earlier than that. Yutani and Hernandez spotlight a couple of competitors debuts, together with Sean Wang’s Dìdi, Nathan Silver’s Between the Temples, and Titus Kaphar’s Exhibiting Forgiveness—the latter that includes “nice performances,” Hernandez says, from a forged led by André Holland—however emphasize there’s a lot to seek out right here. Nonetheless, it doesn’t damage that prime Oscar-nominated expertise together with Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun (Love Me), Saoirse Ronan (The Outrun), Michael Fassbender (Kneecap), and Chiwetel Ejiofor (directing Rob Peace) are among the many faces starring on this yr’s program.
