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Sundance Film Festival · 2023

Sundance Film Festival 2023

Spotlight

Programme

5 films · 3 reviews

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The Eight Mountains

Review preview for The Eight Mountains

In their quietly devastating manner, Groeningen and Vandermeersch examine the fluid nature of our confusion and confidence over our place in the world.

Jeremy Mathews · 5 out of 5
The Eight Mountains is the story of a friendship. Of children becoming men who try to erase the footprints of their fathers, but who, through the twists and turns they take, always end up returning home.

(Country: Italy, Belgium, France; Year: 2022; Director: Felix van Groeningen, Charlotte Vandermeersch; Writer: Paolo Cognetti, Charlotte Vandermeersch, Felix van Groeningen; Stars: Alessandro Borghi, Luca Marinelli, Filippo Timi, Elena Lietti)

Full review

Fiction

Joyland

Review preview for Joyland

It is not so much individual people who cause the problems but rather the constricting cultural circumstances that dictate everyone must play their allocated role.

Amber Wilkinson · 4 out of 5
As the Ranas, a happily patriarchal joint family, yearn for the birth of a baby boy to continue the family line, their youngest son secretly joins an erotic dance theater and falls for an ambitious trans starlet. Their impossible love story illuminates the entire family's desire for a sexual rebellion.

(Country: Pakistan; Year: 2022; Director: Saim Sadiq; Writer: Saim Sadiq; Stars: Sana Jafri, Ali Junejo)

Full review See: Sounding it out - Nathan Ruyle on the new revolution in sound design , Oliver Ridge on Joyland and the Corner Office

Fiction

L'immensità

The story of love between Clara and her children, set in Rome in the '70s.

(Country: Italy, France; Year: 2022; Director: Emanuele Crialese; Writer: Emanuele Crialese, Francesca Manieri, Vittorio Moroni; Stars: Penélope Cruz, Luana Giuliani, Vincenzo Amato, Patrizio Francioni)

North American premiere. Fiction. Day One

Other People's Children (Les Enfants Des Autres)

Review preview for Other People's Children

As richly drawn as it is delicately handled.

Jennie Kermode · 5 out of 5
A childless woman forms a deep bond with her boyfriend's young daughter.

(Country: France; Year: 2022; Director: Rebecca Zlotowski; Writer: Rebecca Zlotowski; Stars: Virginie Efira, Roschdy Zem, Chiara Mastroianni, Callie Ferreira)

Full review

US premiere. Fiction

Squaring the Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis)

An inside look at the studio responsible for some of the most iconic and recognizable album covers of all time - from Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon to Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy.

(Country: UK; Year: 2023; Director: Anton Corbijn)

Documentary