For the next 10 days, the Sundance Film Festival will try to prove, once again, that American independent cinema is alive and well. Over 200 movies will be screened here at Park City as attendees will try to find the next big name in American filmmaking.
Coming off last year’s fairly mediocre lineup, which, regardless, gave us one legitimate dramatic triumph, Lulu Wang’s “The Farewell,” but also an assortment of box-office fails (“Late Night” and “Blinded by the Light”), Sundance this year needs a much-needed blast of creative serum to make us forget about the 2019 edition.
Why is Sundance more important than ever before and why do we badly need the 2020 edition to flourish? Well, because the more Hollywood goes into crass commercialism, the more a film festival like Sundance ultimately matters. It’s as simple as that. American moviemaking is currently at a crucial standstill, with franchises piling up and original content dying on the big screen.
And yet, these last few years, Sundance has prided itself in gathering up inclusive lineups, filled with female filmmakers and people of colour. A valiant effort, if you ask me, but one which could very well sacrifice quotas over quality. This year could be no exception, there’s a record number of films by women in competition (46%). But what films will actually stick in our collective memory? That’s the Million dollar question. Maybe it’ll be the latest films from Sean Durkin, and Julie Taymor or maybe it’ll be something completely out of left field.
Over the last decade, films that have premiered at Sundance include Whiplash, Precious, The Big Sick, A Ghost Story, Sorry to Bother You, Eighth Grade, Leave No Trace, Winter’s Bone, The Kids Are All Right, and Beasts of the Southern Wild. An impressive lineup. Despite some of the qualms mentioned, Sundance still feels vitally important. I guess premiering 9 Best Picture nominees in last 7 years will do that, it’s a continuous hotbed for low-budget indie filmmakers whose untampered cinematic visions are meant to feel less compromised by the greed spewed onto the mainstream by the major studios. Godspeed.