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Sundance Film Festival · 2009

Sundance Film Festival 2009

Spectrum: Dramatic Films

Sundance says: A tribute to the abundance of compelling new voices and the creative spirit in independent filmmaking, the Spectrum program presents out-of-competition dramatic and documentary films from some of the most promising filmmakers in the world today.

Programme

16 films · 5 reviews

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Against The Current

Facing the anniversary of his pregnant wife's tragic death, 35-year-old Paul Thompson enlists the help of two friends to help him swim the length of the Hudson River.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Peter Callahan; Writer: Peter Callahan; Stars: Joseph Fiennes, Justin Kirk, Elizabeth Reaser, Mary Tyler Moore, Michelle Trachtenberg, Pell James, Martin Shakar, Constance Barron, Amy Hargreaves, Seth Kanor)

World Premiere

The Anarchist's Wife (La Mujer del Anarquista)

During the Spanish Civil War an idealistic young lawyer combating Franco's Fascist troops is separated from his wife and children.

(Country: Germany, Spain, France; Year: 2008; Director: Marie Noelle, Peter Sehr; Writer: Marie Noelle, Ray Loriga; Stars: María Valverde, Juan Diego Botto, Ivana Baquero, Nina Hoss, Jean-Marc Barr, Laura Morante, Irene Montalà, Adrià Collado, Biel Durán, Pere Arquillué)

North American Premiere

Barking Water

Irene and Frankie have had a tumultuous relationship for 40 years. As Frankie lies on his deathbed, Irene comes back to him one last time to break him out of the hospital and take him home.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Sterlin Harjo; Writer: Sterlin Harjo; Stars: Lori Lynne Cross, Isabel Archuleta, Laura C Spencer)

World Premiere

Children Of Invention

Two young children are left to fend for themselves when their mother is arrested for unwittingly taking part in an illegal pyramid scheme.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Tze Chun; Writer: Tze Chun; Stars: Cindy Cheung, Michael Chen, Crystal Chiu, Stephen Gevedon, Frank Pando, Kieran Campion, Jackson Ning, Remmi Franklin, Yan Xi, Suzan Mikiel Kennedy)

World Premiere

Everything Strange And New

Trapped by a life he never intended, a man struggles to navigate family, sexuality and drug addiction.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Frazer Bradshaw; Writer: Frazer Bradshaw; Stars: Luis Saguar, Jerry McDaniel, Beth Lisick)

World Premiere

Helen

A successful psychiatrist fights her own clinical depression.

(Country: US, UK, Germany; Year: 2008; Director: Sandra Nettelbeck; Writer: Sandra Nettelbeck; Stars: Ashley Judd, Goran Visnjic, Lauren Lee Smith, Alexia Fast, Alberta Watson, David Nykl, David Hewlett, Leah Cairns, Ali Liebert, Chelah Horsdal)

World Premiere

The Immaculate Conception Of Little Dizzle

After losing his high-paying job, Dory takes a gig as a night janitor in order to pay rent. Alone late at night inside a market research firm, he discovers something worse than his new job cleaning toilets - a conniving corporate executive has made him the subject of a bizarre experiment.

(Country: US; Year: 2008; Director: David Russo; Writer: David Russo; Stars: Tania Raymonde, Natasha Lyonne, Marshall Allman, Vince Vieluf, Aaron Hart, Tygh Runyan, Russell Hodgkinson, Agatha Nowicki, Mara Stevë, Jay Wesley Cochran)

See: Sundance Diary: Day Seven

World Premiere

Johnny Mad Dog

Review preview for Johnny Mad Dog

The film is a heartfelt cry for someone to stop these children being exploited so cruelly, but offers no easy answers.

Jeff Robson · 5 out of 5
As civil war rages in an unnamed African country, the lives of a boy soldier and a young girl fleeing the fighting become intertwined.

(Country: France, Belgium, Liberia; Year: 2008; Director: Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire; Writer: Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire; Stars: Christophe Minie, Daisy Victoria Vandy) , Trailer

Full review

North American Premiere

Lymelife

Review preview for Lymelife

While it might be a bit too heavy handed in terms of symbolism and part of a very crowded genre, Lymelife isn't guilty of any major sins either.

Owen Van Spall · 2.5 out of 5
Set in the 1970s, a unique take on the dangers of the American dream seen through the innocent eyes of a 15-year-old boy.

(Country: US; Year: 2008; Director: Derick Martini; Writer: Derick Martini, Steven Martini; Stars: Alec Baldwin, Kieran Culkin, Rory Culkin, Jill Hennessy, Timothy Hutton, Cynthia Nixon, Emma Roberts, Adam Scarimbolo, Phillip Pennestri, Logan Huffman)

Full review

U.S. Premiere

The Missing Person

Review preview for The Missing Person

There may not be much beyond the surface, but it's a fine surface

Scott Macdonald · 3 out of 5
Neonoir about a private eye charged with following a man presumed dead after 9/11.

(Country: US; Year: 2008; Director: Noah Buschel; Writer: Noah Buschel; Stars: Michael Shannon, Amy Ryan, Frank Wood, Linda Emond, Paul Sparks, Margaret Colin, John Ventimiglia, Yul Vazquez, Merritt Wever, Daniel Franzese)

Full review

World Premiere

Mission Street Rhapsody (La Mission)

A traditional, Latino father in San Francisco's Mission District struggles to come to terms with his teenage son's homosexuality.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Peter Bratt; Writer: Peter Bratt; Stars: Jeremy Ray Valdez, Max Rosenak, Patrick Shining Elk, Benjamin Bratt, Kevin Michael Richardson, Erika Alexander, Jesse Borrego, Christopher Greene, Tina Huang, Frederick Keith Johnson)

World Premiere

Once More With Feeling

A comedy about a psychiatrist who undergoes a midlife crisis and pursues his long-lost ambition of becoming a singer through karaoke.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Jeff Lipsky; Writer: Gina O'Brien; Stars: Drea de Matteo, Linda Fiorentino, Chazz Palminteri, Susan Misner, Lauren Bittner, Grace Johnston, David Aaron Baker, David Call, Daisy Tahan, Matt Doyle)

World Premiere

The Only Good Indian

Set in early 1900s Kansas, a teenage Native American boy is taken from his family and forced to attend an Indian 'training' school to assimilate into White society.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Kevin Willmott; Writer: Thomas L. Carmody; Stars: Wes Studi, J Kenneth Campbell, Winter Fox Frank, Paul Butler, Thirza Defoe, Christopher Wheatley, Laura Kirk, Delanna Studi, Blake Robbins, Kevin Geer)

World Premiere

Pomegranates And Myrrh (al-Mor wa al rumman)

Review preview for Pomegranates And Myrrh

Pomegranates And Myrrh is concerned with living within the Palestinian diaspora, and living within a situation you have no power to change.

Chris · 3.5 out of 5
The wife of a Palestinian prisoner searches for freedom.

(Country: Palestine; Year: 2008; Director: Najwa Najjar; Writer: Najwa Najjar; Stars: Hiam Abbass, Yasmine Elmasri, Ali Sliman, Ahmad Abu Sal'oum, Ashraf Farah, Lufuf Nuweiser, Lea Tsmeal, Walid Abdul Salam, Manal Awad, Samia Kuzmoz)

Full review

North American Premiere

The Vicious Kind

Suffering insomnia and testy by nature, Caleb Sinclaire reluctantly picks up his brother Peter at college and brings him and his new girlfriend Emma home to his estranged father's house for Thanksgiving.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Lee Toland Krieger; Writer: Lee Toland Krieger; Stars: Brittany Snow, JK Simmons, Adam Scott, Alex Frost, Alysia Reiner, Bill Buell, Sonny Vellozzi, Robert Bizik, Jordan Berkow, Kate Krieger)

World Premiere

World's Greatest Dad

Review preview for World's Greatest Dad

A pitch-black satire on our selective memories of death and the deceased.

Scott Macdonald · 4 out of 5
A comedy about a high school poetry teacher who learns that the things you want most may not be the things that make you happy.

(Country: US; Year: 2009; Director: Bob Goldthwait; Writer: Bob Goldthwait; Stars: Robin Williams, Daryl Sabara, Tom Kenny, Lorraine Nicholson, Geoffrey Pierson, Henry Simmons, Alexie Gilmore, Jermaine Williams, Toby Huss, Bruce Hornsby)

Full review See: Sundance Diary: Day Six , Bobcat Goldthwait interview about Sleeping Dogs and his plans for World's Greatest Dad

World Premiere