My Sundance
Cursing nuns, nunchucka revenge, and the end of the world. I covered the 2017 fest for Nerdist.
David Lowery’s A Ghost Story
“Among its many themes — loyalty, eternity, loss — A Ghost Story seeks to recast and question the ties that bind us. The clearest examples come in gaining a rounded view of C and M’s relationship, portrayed at first almost as a product of a faulty, rosy memory. There are fights and incompatibilities, but there’s also music and comfort and love — all anchored by the sense that the ghost is hanging around the house (and trying to get the note in the wall) solely for the wife that lived. His desire for her allows him to lash out on the physical world, flashing light bulbs to white hot brightness or, once a new family moves in, throwing their dishes against the wall and scaring them into moving.
Your cherished loved ones may be someone else’s poltergeist.”
Horror Anthology XX
Jeff Baena’s The Little Hours
Al Gore and An Inconvenient Sequel
Helene Hegemann’s Axolotl Overkill
“That’s the shared, secret language that guides every character. Like an improv troupe, they share the deep intimacy of accepting each other’s wacky ideas without question. Maybe that’s deciding to bail on a restaurant right after sitting down and ordering 5 mineral waters. Maybe that’s deciding to have sex with the cab driver who just dropped off the date you made out with earlier. Maybe that’s bringing your new water-based pet to the hottest nightclub in Berlin. Whatever feels right. Acceptance is the watchword.”
Hong Kong Nihilism in Free and Easy
Taylor Sheridan’s Wind River
The History of Comedy
Michael Showalter’s The Big Sick
“Nanjiani stars as a slightly fictional version of himself–the son of Pakistani Muslim immigrants who’s trying to make it as a stand-up comedian (when he should want to be a doctor), who has cold feet about arranged marriages (despite a parade of women his mom invites to “drop in” at dinner), and who keeps a lot of his life secret from a traditional family. He meets Emily (Zoe Kazan doing her best work in a field of great work) when she heckles him at one of his shows, and they do the dance of pretending to value singledom over the connective spark banging at the door to their brains.”
Holographic Jon Hamm in Marjorie Prime
Peter Dinklage in Rememory
Casting JonBenet
Hitchcock-obsessed documentary 78/52
Sam Elliott’s award-worthy turn in The Hero
“This story of one man’s regrets and triumphs offers the full spectrum: it’s engrossing and funny and sad. It seems trite to bring up next year’s awards season while at Sundance, but Elliott’s worthiness is undeniable. This performance is masterful in its subtlety, wit and anguished realism, proving that it’s absolutely bonkers that Elliott hasn’t even been nominated for an Oscar before. Why, America, have we so neglected everyone’s golden-sandpaper-throated grandpa?”
