Another successful Sundance Film Festival has concluded and I thoroughly enjoyed my experience this year. I was able to see fifteen films, including everything that I really wanted to see, and I liked them all, some more than others. My first film was You Were Never Really Here which stars Joaquin Phoenix as tormented hit man, suffering from PTSD as the result of an abusive childhood and his experiences as a soldier in Iraq, whose weapon of choice is a hammer. He is hired to rescue a young girl but, when the rescue goes awry, he discovers that he was set up and vows vengeance on everyone involved. It is a brutal but strangely beautiful film about a deeply flawed character finding redemption which is a favorite theme of mine. Next I saw Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot, another film starring Joaquin Phoenix. This is the true story about cartoonist John Callahan after he becomes paralyzed in an alcohol-related car accident. He uses his cartoons, which feature very dark humor, as a way of coping with his paralysis and as a means of achieving sobriety. Phoenix gives a riveting performance, as does Jonah Hill as his sponsor, and I liked the inclusion of Callahan's actual cartoons. My next film was Blindspotting which I picked because it stars Daveed Diggs (the original Lafayette/Jefferson in Hamilton). Diggs and Rafael Casal play Collin and Miles, two childhood best friends who now have a tense relationship. Collin has recently been released from prison and is about to complete his probation. We eventually learn that both of them committed the crime but, because Collin is black, he was the only one held responsible. There are a lot of themes explored in this film but I found it to be an incredibly powerful commentary about racism that resonated with me deeply. Diggs was at the Q&A after the film which just about blew my mind! Next up was Lizzie, one of my most anticipated films of the festival. It is a psychological thriller exploring the reasons behind the killing of Lizzie Borden's family. Both Chloe Sevigny and Kristen Stewart give outstanding performances and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I saw it. Another highly anticipated film was Colette, which tells the true story of one of the most celebrated writers from the Belle Epoque. Keira Knightley stars in this lush bio-pic about a woman whose husband takes credit for her work until she eventually asserts her independence. I love a good period piece but this also taps into the current zeitgeist of female empowerment. Next, I was able to attend a free midnight screening of the documentary Believer about Dan Reynolds, the Imagine Dragons frontman, and his attempts to reconcile his LDS faith with the church's policy towards its LGTBQ members. This documentary is extremely well done and finds just the right balance between highlighting a significant problem within the church (suicide is currently the number one cause of death for young people in Utah) while still being respectful. I love Imagine Dragons and I really respect Dan Reynolds for the position he has taken. Last Monday my only film was Wildlife, the directorial debut of Paul Dano (who was at the Q&A after the film). In the late 1950s, a family with a history of moving from place to place has recently settled in a rural town in Montana. The teenage son must deal with the disintegration of his parents' marriage when his father leaves his mother on her own to fight wild fires. It is a simple but tragic story, anchored by an incredible performance by Carey Mulligan as a woman trapped by her circumstances. Tuesday night I saw Hereditary, a horror film about the devastating effect a mysterious woman's death has on her family. This film has an almost unbearable feeling of tension leading up to the final resolution. I like to be genuinely scared, rather than shocked, by horror films and this one legitimately scared me (and the rest of the audience as well because there was much nervous laughter and even screaming). On Wednesday I was able to take my students to a screening of Ophelia. In my opinion, Ophelia is the most thinly drawn character and her fate is the most unsatisfactory in Shakespeare's version so I found her backstory to be incredibly compelling and her final resolution to be empowering in this retelling. The film is beautiful and Daisy Ridley is fantastic in the title role. My only complaint is that the final duel deviated from Lisa Klein's novel (upon which the film is based), turning what could have been a powerful moment into a silly slow-motion melodrama. On Saturday I had three films! The first was An Evening With Beverly Luff Linn which is a comedy of the absurd. I don't even know how to describe this farce except to say that the over-the-top performances by Aubrey Plaza, Emile Hirsch, and Jemaine Clement made me laugh out loud. The next film was The Miseducation of Cameron Post, starring Chloe Grace Moretz in a truly affecting performance as a young woman who is sent by her Evangelical family to a gay conversion camp after she is found having sex with a girl. It is a poignant look at a group of teens learning to accept themselves. The last film of the day was Puzzle which, surprisingly, ended up being a favorite from the festival. Kelly Macdonald plays a wife and mother living an uneventful life in the suburbs who discovers a passion for jigsaw puzzles which leads to her awakening. Who knew that a character driven film about completing puzzles could be so compelling? As director Marc Turtletaub stated in the Q&A, it is a coming-of-age story about a 40 year old woman and I really liked it. Yesterday I also had three films, beginning with Hearts Beat Loud. I loved this film so much! It is a tender story about a father-daughter relationship starring Nick Offerman and Kiersey Clemons and it is just lovely! During the summer before she leaves for college, a young woman begins writing songs with her father and, when one of them becomes popular on Spotify, he tries to compel her to stay in order get a record deal until he realizes that he needs to let her go. I absolutely loved the scene where Frank hears their song being played in a coffee shop! The next film was The Happy Prince, starring Rupert Everett as Oscar Wilde during the last years of his life after being imprisoned for gross indecency. Everett gives an amazing performance but I sometimes found the timeline to be a bit muddled as it is framed by Wilde's recollections on his deathbed interspersed with nonlinear flashbacks. As a teacher of British literature, I really loved the use of Wilde's writings as voice-over narration throughout the film. My final film of the festival was The Catcher Was a Spy which was a highly coveted ticket. Paul Rudd plays Moe Berg, a major league baseball player who joins the OSS during World War II and is tasked with determining whether Germany is building an atomic bomb. I thought the ending was a bit anticlimactic but I enjoyed it as a fan of espionage films. It was a wonderful ten days and, as always, my favorite part was talking to the people I met in line. My favorite conversation was with two really cool guys about the brilliance of A Ghost Story which screened at Sundance last year! I can hardly wait for next year!
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