Stephen King is at it again.

Sundance continues with Benh Zeitlin’s much anticipated film

Despite the “hits” at last year’s Sundance Film Festival tanking at the box-office (“Brittany Runs A Marathon,” “Late Night”) distributors still seem to be in a very buying mood again this year, so much so that every single one of the acquisitions can’t be mentioned in a single article. Despite last year’s disappointments, the cost for distributors to land high-profile films at Sundance keeps going up. And yet, many of the films which have been bought so far this year don’t necessarily seem like automatic hits. Some buyers just never learn.

Sam Mendes has won the Directors Guild of America for “1917.”

Two dramas and a doc dominated day three of Sundance 2020.

Sundance kicks off with three duds and one winner.

“The Last Thing he Wanted” makes its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival tomorrow and is released globally on Netflix February 21st, 2020.

I won’t be attending the opening night film of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival because it reads like an easy movie to take a pass on. A Taylor Swift doc, titled “Miss Americana,” will be screening at the Eccles this evening at 9pm MST. Instead, I’ll be at the Library screening of Justin Simien’s “Bad Hair.”

Bong Joon Ho’s “Parasite” has become a phenomenon, making $148 million worldwide and garnering six Oscar nominations. Although, many audiences are still trying to catch up with Bong’s instant classic, the director has not been shy in his desire to eventually release a black and white version of the film. In fact, the black and white version of “Parasite” was created prior to the film’s premiere in Cannes. Bong claims being inspired by F.W Murnau’s 1922 silent horror movie, Nosferatu and others.

I reviewed “The Lodge” for The Playlist last January at Sundance [Read More].

For the next 10 days, the Sundance Film Festival will try to prove, once again, that American independent cinema is alive and well.

2008’s Ben Stiller's "Tropic Thunder," existing in this maddening stratosphere, shows just how much things have changed at the movies the last decade.

Larry David is back and we should all be grateful

Quentin Tarantino is, again, insisting that he plans to quit making movies after his 10th feature. Of course, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” is his ninth feature, so that just leaves one more. This whole notion of retiring after 10 movies comes from the director’s theory that a director’s quality of work only gets worse as it goes along.

During the last decade, director Denis Villeneuve proved that he was an absolute force to be reckoned with. It all started with his 2010 film “Incendies” getting nominated for an Oscar in the Foreign-Language category. This eventually led him to become a major directorial voice in American film, directing “Prisoners,” “Sicario,” “Arrival,” and “Blade Runner 2049.”

Around two years ago, Variety was reporting that Spielberg held a secret table read for an unknown movie which, rumor had it, seemed to be a biopic of composer Leonard Bernstein — the story at the time mentioned that the aptly titled “Bernstein” could leapfrog ahead of Spielberg’s planned “West Side Story” remake. The supposed “top talent” that attended the table read was unknown at the time,  they had all signed non-disclosure agreements, but what was quite clear was that Spielberg would have had to juggle a bunch of projects he had going on to make room for “Bernstein.”

With the year nearly over, we now have 2020 to look forward to. Luckily, I have seen quite a few movies expected to be part of the 2020 release calendar — whether they were seen through the 2019 festival circuit or private screenings, I’ve gathered 12 films that should stamp a lasting major mark on the upcoming cinematic year.

People are flipping out that Bong Joon-ho’s “Parasite” won the top prize at the Screen Actors Guild Award last night. Is it going to become the first foreign-language film to ever win the Best Picture Oscar? Not necessarily. My money is “1917,” but “Parasite” still has a major shot.