> The Sundance Film Festival, like Toronto, issues its announcements about the films that will be screening in several stages.  (Sundance’s sadism about actually obtaining tickets, however, is all its own.)  Today came the first release for the January 2012 Festival, covering the US and international competition slates in Dramatic and Documentary films.  These are […]

  Zach Braff’s WISH I WAS HERE, his first film as a writer-director since Garden State 10 years ago, mixes genuine, deeply-felt emotion with the kind of contrivances that would grate even on a second-rate sitcom.  (This week’s episode:  Dad tries to homeschool the kids!  And Uncle Jonah wears a costume to Comic-Con just to […]

There are certain inevitabilities at Sundance, apart from snow:  something will go wrong (after I waited on line for 2 hours on opening day, the box office discovered that it had lost one of my passes), and no matter how carefully one chooses one’s film selections, some of the hottest titles will be missed.  For […]

  THE WORLD TO COME (Bleecker Street – March 2):  Although the story is set in 1856, this is 2021, so it’s not hard to see where Mona Fastvold’s The World To Come is heading.  Ron Hansen and Jim Shepard’s script begins in the dead of winter, in the wilderness that was upstate New York […]

  THE OUTRUN (no distrib):  Films about alcoholics and addicts in recovery are too numerous to count, and it’s easy to understand why.  The stories offer a clear narrative path, usually with an inspirational destination (occasionally with a tragic end, which can be just as cathartic), as well as a ready-made showcase for the star, […]

> Josh Radnor’s writing/directing debut happythankyoumoreplease, which played Sundance a couple of years ago, was a promising, entertaining NY-set romantic comedy-drama that hailed from the Woody Allen division of indie film. His second film LIBERAL ARTS, which premiered last night at the festival, still sips from the fount of Woody (in this case, particularly from […]

  If you go to too many Sundances, or see too many indie films, there are certain templates you come to recognize all too quickly.  THE LIFEGUARD, written and directed by Liz W. Garcia, a TV writer (Memphis Beat, Cold Case) making her directing debut, follows so many of these conventions that it could have […]

  Every year when I arrive at Sundance, I swear to myself that I’ll review each film there as soon as I’ve seen it, but after making the effort to keep up for the first day or two, a daily screening schedule that starts at 8:30AM each morning (earlier if you need to be on a Wait List line, and that […]