In her summary piece on this year’s Sundance Film Festival, The New York Times‘s Manohla Dargis lauded the documentary line-up, noting a greater consistency of quality this year and most years, also allowing that the films “were more intellectually engaging … Continue reading Sundance 2023 — Part 3
D. Smith’s documentary Kokomo City flouts all sorts of rules of nonfiction filmmaking. The primary mission of the film is to point the lens at several different Black trans women who make their living as sex workers and allow them … Continue reading Sundance 2023 — Part 2
My most reliable of reliable sources on the ground in Park City, Utah reports that the first in-person staging of the Sundance Film Festival since 2020 was a full return to the halcyon days of old in at least one … Continue reading Sundance 2023 — Part 1
Much as the Sundance Film Festival is adored for showcasing uniquely daring independent films, the roster always has a few slots for the genially frivolous. That big-tent approach has sometimes led to truly baffling entries over the years. Just as … Continue reading Sundance 2022 — Part 3
Much as I appreciate film festivals’ general commitment to heavy dramas and effectively dispiriting documentaries, I am equally pleased that there is often special space carved out for the gloriously gory. You Won’t Be Alone, the feature debut from seasoned … Continue reading Sundance 2022 — Part 2
Before Sundance Film Festival organizers made the omicron-driven choice to cancel all in-person screenings in their longtime home of Park City, Utah, they were already one of the organizations that determined there was value in building a slightly different event … Continue reading Sundance 2022 — Part 1
I remember being on airplane watching a parent in the seat in front of mine attempt to keep their kid occupied by dialing up the R-rated DC animation adaptation of the seminal nineteen-eighties graphic novel Batman: The Killing Joke, presumably … Continue reading Sundance 2021 — Part 4
In the festival introduction to his feature I Was a Simple Man, director Christopher Makoto Yogi inviting the audience to visit Hawai‘i for a couple hours. That struck me as an amusing, diversionary way to introduce what looked to be … Continue reading Sundance 2021 — Part 3
Part of experiencing Sundance only vicariously in previous years was having my curiosity piqued about films being positioned as contender in Academy Awards categories for a ceremony over a year out. It’s blissfully odd to instead actually view and assess … Continue reading Sundance 2021 — Part 2
When Steven Soderbergh picked up the first ever Audience Award for a narrative film at the Sundance Film Festival, in 1989, everything changed. Soderbergh’s film, sex, lies, and videotape, went on to be an arthouse sensation, and Sundance was suddenly … Continue reading Sundance 2021 — Part 1
Coffee for Two 