showbuzzdaily Sundance reviews

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “After the Wedding” & “Adam”

AFTER THE WEDDING (no distrib): The Danish 2006 After the Wedding, which won that year’s Best Foreign Film Oscar, was shot by director Suzanne Biers in the then-trendy Dogma style, heavy on pseudo-verite camerawo...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “892” & “After Yang”

892 (no distrib): John Boyega’s turbo-charged performance fuels this true story. In 2017, when Brian Brown-Easley (Boyega) entered a Wells Fargo branch in a suburb of Atlanta and informed the teller that his ba...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Review: “My Old School”

MY OLD SCHOOL (no distrib): Although the story is apparently well-known in the UK, here the twisty tale that Jono McLeod unfurls in his documentary would constitute a spoiler, so we’ll leave things vague here. ...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “When You Finish Saving The World” & “Fresh”

It’s the second consecutive Virtual Sundance, with safety, convenience and isolation in place of weather, shuttle buses and community. Over the next several days, we’ll be bringing you reviews of several Su...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “Nanny,” “Good Luck To You, Leo Grande” & “Resurrection”

NANNY (no distrib): Think Netflix’s Maid, but as a (sort of) horror movie. Aisha (Anna Diop) is an undocumented Senegalese immigrant in New York who works as a nanny for the daughter of a well-off couple, Amy (...

by Mitch Salem

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “R#J” & “A Glitch In the Matrix”

R#J: Every generation gets its Romeo & Juliet. In Carey Williams’ R#J, the words of Shakespeare are only occasionally heard. Instead, these extremely up-to-date Capulets and Montagues communicate almost ...

by Mitch Salem

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Review: “The Farewell”

THE FAREWELL (A24): Lulu Wang’s The Farewell is what could be called Sundance Classic, a small, very personal film nurtured by the festival into wide enough attention that A24 paid $6M to release it. It’s...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “God’s Country” & “Phoenix Rising”

GOD’S COUNTRY (no distrib): A deliberative character study that’s also a thriller of sorts, anchored by one of the best performances of Thandiwe Newton’s career. When two hunters (Joris Jarsky and Y...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “Palm Trees and Power Lines,” “Am I OK?” and “Lucy and Desi”

PALM TREES AND POWER LINES (no distrib): Jamie Dack’s first feature film (from a script written with Audrey Findlay) means to unsettle, and it does. 17-year old Lea (Lily McInerny) is stuck in a dead-end Southe...

by Mitch Salem

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ShowbuzzDaily’s Sundance 2022 Reviews: “Living,” “Call Jane” & “Watcher”

LIVING (no distrib): Over the years, there’s periodically been talk about remaking Akira Kurosawa’s 1952 masterpiece Ikiru, including a rumored updated US version that would have starred Tom Hanks in the le...

by Mitch Salem

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “The Sunlit Night” & “Wounds”

THE SUNLIT NIGHT (no distrib): The last thing one would have expected from the director of the genuinely scabrous Wetlands was a follow-up that seems to trying to meld NY Jewish comedy with the kind of enchanted romcom...

by Mitch Salem

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Review: “Judas and the Black Messiah”

JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH (Warners/HBO Max – February 12): The title refers to the FBI informant Bill O’Neal (played here by LaKeith Stanfield) and the Illinois Black Panthers leader Fred Hampton (Daniel ...

by Mitch Salem

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “Brittany Runs A Marathon” & “Big Time Adolescence”

BRITTANY RUNS A MARATHON (Amazon): Paul Downs Colaizzo, previously a playwright, makes a remarkably assured film writing/directing debut with Brittany Runs a Marathon, which features a breakout star performance by Jill...

by Mitch Salem

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