Watching 35 Movies At Sundance 2021

It’s February 15, 2021 and we’re back!

Film festivals were always an inscrutable Black Box for me - I knew they were super prestigious and exclusive because that’s where all the famous people and artists went to be seen every year - but actually attending one seemed like a spider-web of work to figure out travel and credentials. With Sundance moving virtual this year due to the pandemic, I knew it was my chance to dip my toes in one of the world’s premier film festivals from the comfort of home.

(I wasn’t alone - Sundance says over half a million views for 2021, their biggest audience ever!)

Here’s some of the main takeaways I learned from the experience:

1. Sundance is all about discovery - The main draw of Sundance is a showcase of independent films to be sold for wider distribution. Because the event has become so big, the in-person festival usually has a bunch of high profile premieres of established directors/actors alongside the indies - but this year a lot of the big names/studios held back due to the virtual event. This let the spotlight shine on the newer creators. Sundance is pretty much the SXSW of film - you’ll find the next big creator/movie there. The cool part for people who exclusive experiences is that most of the films that show won’t be seen by the general public for months, if not years.
2. Moviegoing is more fun as a shared experience - Sundance did a good job of creating a “festival vibe” by staggering each film’s premiere at a certain hour block each day as well as having some pre and post-film chat rooms to let people talk about what they’ve seen. It sounds kinda cheesy, but it actually worked. Most of the conversations I had in these were really wholesome and people talked about what films they’ve liked so far - basically capturing that “waiting in line small talk” you would get at the in person screening.
3. Almost every movie at Sundance is “good” - Even if some films were hit or miss for me in how much I loved them - the level of craftsmanship for almost every movie I saw was solid, if not amazing. Rating these movies felt like grading on a curve in a class of overachievers - objectively, the worst movie I saw at Sundance would be way better than some of the dreck you’d see on Netflix or even a crappy studio theater movie.

The Films

Like the subject line says, I did actually watch 35 films in 7 days. My mind was pretty mushy, but I saw a lot of good stories that made me feel feelings. I won’t make this essay a billion pages long by writing about each one, but I’ll give y’all a couple highlights and if you’re interested in reading more, you can read my Lettrboxd diary or let me know if you want more in depth thoughts!

• My favorite two films from the competitions were CODA and Flee

  • CODA is a real crowd-pleasing coming of age movie about a Child of Deaf Adults growing up in Gloucester, Massachusetts. I laughed, I cried, I had a good time, really wished I could have seen this in Eccles Theatre with a thousand people because the standing ovation and goosebumps would have been unforgettable. Apple bought this movie for a record $25 million and it won several grand jury and audience prizes at the festival, so at least more people will get to see this one.

  • Flee was an incredible Danish documentary about an Afghan refugee’s journey to freedom in the 1980s. It blends Miyazaki-like animation with archival footage and some pop culture elements that make it both engaging and powerful. Neon bought the film for wider distribution with Riz Ahmed and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Lannister!) voice the forthcoming English voice dub.

• Judas and the Black Messiah was really good. This was one of the big premieres that got added to the festival slate, but was quite amazing. It tells the story of Fred Hampton, a Black Panther activist in Illinois who was assassinated by the FBI - the film plays like The Departed so you’ll be on the edge of your seat. It just came out on HBO MAX, so you can watch it right now!

• Sundance documentaries hit different - almost all of them told insightful stories, but here are some highlights:

  • Summer of Soul (…or when the revolution could not be televised) - Questlove’s directorial debut has some amazing footage from the Harlem Cultural Festival in 1969 that was forgotten because of Woodstock happening the same year. (this one won the grand jury U.S. documentary prize)

  • At The Ready - a documentary about an afterschool organization in El Paso that teaches kids who want a career in law enforcement/border patrol.

  • Try Harder! - follows kids from Lowell High School in San Francisco, a merit-based admissions school that puts kids under immense pressure to get into good colleges and be high achieving.

Full ranked list of the films I saw at Sundance 2021:

Our New Favorite Song:

From the closing credits of Judas and the Black Messiah: H.E.R - Fight For You

In Conclusion: