The first half of the first-ever virtual Sundance is in the can and Eckerd College’s Sundance Film Festival correspondents are reporting back. Over the first four days of the festival, students and faculty watched over 50 films, took selfies in the festival’s “New Frontier” section, strolled down the festival’s virtual Main Street, and attended online film parties where we talked with creators of this year’s innovative program from the comforts of home. In the past, Eckerd has gone to Sundance but this year Sundance has come to Eckerd.
As Sami Trattel, an Eckerd junior and Sundance correspondent this year, puts it, “When you go to a film festival, it is a place that acts as a setting for a group of people to watch the art of film. It does not have to be purely enjoyable or profitable but is rather an experience in and of itself.” This year’s experience has been more flexible and inclusive than ever, allowing our group, collectively attending from as far as Maine and the United Kingdom as well as St. Petersburg, Florida, to experience the festival safely on our own terms. We have gathered virtually and in-person, socially distanced in Eckerd’s Miller Auditorium, participated in live question & answer sessions with filmmakers, and taken the pulse of contemporary independent film.
Here are some takeaways from first half of the festival:
Opening night films were safe bets
At its opening night screening with director Sîan Heder and stars Emilia Jones and Academy Award-winner Marlee Matlin in attendance on Zoom, “CODA,” the fictional story of the teenage daughter who is the only hearing member of her family, earned the equivalent of a virtual standing ovation. With its indie focus on finding one’s individual voice while speaking for your family, “CODA” set a new record for distribution deals at Sundance, besting last year’s previous record for “Palm Springs.” Apple picked up “CODA” for an unprecedented $25 million for its Apple TV+ streaming service.
Animated documentary “Flee” earned the first pickup of the festival with a deal with Neon, the distributor behind last year’s Oscar phenomenon “Parasite,” with what could be an eye towards another awards run. “Flee” tells a little known story about an Afghan refugee in a style, like that of “Waltz with Bashir” and “Tower,” that highlights the universality of this very specific narrative.
“In the Same Breath,” which already had a deal with HBO before its Sundance premiere, is an arresting presentation of the first footage from Wuhan during lockdown and its depiction of the lockstep presentation of information about COVID-19 in the media. Director Nanfu Wang, whose previous doc “One Child Nation” won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, returns with an assured and unnerving look at our very recent past and potential future of the pandemic.
Musician Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s directorial debut “Summer of Soul (…Or When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)” is a revelation of previously unexplored music footage in the vein of “Amazing Grace.” The film presents the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a milestone of forgotten music and Black history that featured Nina Simone, Stevie Wonder, Mahalia Jackson, Mavis Staples, and Sly and the Family Stone, through interviews and archival footage that make you feel like you were there.
Documentaries were the place to be
In addition to “Flee,” “In the Same Breath,” and “Summer of Soul,” the feature documentary slate this year was especially strong with entertainment docs like “Ailey”, a portrait of legendary Black choreographer Alvin Ailey, the children’s programming doc “Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street,” and the timely “Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go For It.”
Pedro Kos’s “Rebel Hearts” follows the sisters of Los Angeles-based Immaculate Heart College, who chafed against the confines of traditional marriage and motherhood in 1960s America only to find themselves similarly bound by the traditions of the Catholic Church. Conceived and shot during the pandemic in New York, Pacho Velez’s “Searchers” offered a similar salve to the soul as a diverse set of New Yorkers, including the director, look for love in all the digital places.
In the subgenre of high school and youth documentaries, which this year included “Homeroom,” “Try Harder!,” “Cusp,” Maisie Crow’s “At the Ready” stands out for its exploration of the contradictions at the heart of American identity. The film follows three high school students as they participate in their Texas high school’s law enforcement club. We watch these Mexican-American youth negotiate the ironies of aspiring towards a career path that promises financial security while posing challenges to their personal identities.
New voices, unsettling dreams of the past
Sundance’s Next (stylized “NEXT”) and midnight sections, which celebrate unconventional films and cult features, proved popular with our Eckerd correspondents again this year, especially when they looked toward the past. Writer-director Prano Bailey-Bond’s “Censor” explores the effects of watching “video nasties” by recreating the look of watching a 1980s VHS tape.
In a similar vein, “Strawberry Mansion” asks what if our dreams were literally a form of capital, subject to taxation and commodification, and stored much like movies themselves—previously on VHS and now on digital—for outsiders to see and fall in love with. “Cryptozoo,” a hand-drawn animated environmental melodrama, also focuses on the control of dreams, both by the government and by a “cryptid,” an imaginary creature that challenges our notion of what it means to be human. Set in the 18th century, “Eight for Silver” offers a new look at the werewolf genre while “R#J” refreshes “Romeo and Juliet” as told entirely through cell phone screens and social media.
Familiar faces make good
Finally, familiar faces proved a good bet at this year’s festival. Rebecca Hall’s directorial debut, “Passing,” an adaptation of Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel, is a nuanced study of identity as a form of performance. Jerrod Carmichael’s “On the Count of Three” is an assured debut that examines the power of friendship in the face of depression. If Harold and Kumar went to an existential White Castle with a suicide pact, it would be this film.
Fans of Nicholas Cage will not be disappointed by his return to Sundance in prolific Japanese director Sion Sono’s English-language debut, “Prisoners of the Ghostland.” One of the Eckerd correspondents’ most anticipated film of the fest, this gonzo post-apocalyptic samurai western is a feast for the eyes throughout, from its candy-hued opening to Nicholas Cage’s colorful performance as a bank robber-turned-mercenary-turned-nuclear savior looking for redemption in a bombed-out world of extreme violence and eye-popping production design.
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This article appears in Feb 11-17, 2021.