2015 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Marc Silver’s 3½

Gun culture, racism and the court system are revolving themes in docu subject matters and if there is a common thread to find between his Marc Silver’s latest docu 3 and ½ and his 2013 Sundance premiered docu-narrative mixer Who is Dayani Cristal? it might be that homicides are hardly ever an open and shut case. There are unfathomable long term repercussions. Surely combining his investigative and probing docu-style, while his last film featuring Gael García Bernal was about the silenced, this spiritual cousin to Fruitvale Station is about a longer fight for justice in the face of injustice. Having received some coin from BRITDOC Foundation, 2014 Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund, Good Pitch donation from Candescent, this past September the filmmaker was invited to Sundance Institute’s annual Music and Sound Design Lab. Currently somewhere between production and the post-production phase,  my thinking is that everyone involved would be pressed to get this out of the gates with a 2015 fest release – especially an American film fest.

Gist: Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving November 2012, four boys in a red SUV pull into a gas station after spending time at the mall buying sneakers and talking to girls. With music blaring, one boy exits the car and enters the store, a quick stop for a soda and a pack of gum. A man and a woman pull up next to the boys in the station, making a stop for a bottle of wine. The woman enters the store and an argument breaks out when the driver of the second car asks the boys to turn the music down. 3 1/2 minutes and ten bullets later, one of the boys is dead. 3 1/2 MINUTES dissects the aftermath of this fatal encounter. Here is a solid overview of the Jordan Davis case.

Production Co./Producers: MottoPictures’ Carolyn Hepburn (God Loves Uganda) & Minette Nelson. Executive Producers: Orlando Bagwell, Bonni Cohen, Julie Goldman.

Prediction: Silver’s Who is Dayani Cristal? was an unofficial opener in the World Cinema Documentary Competition, this could land in the same category or fall into the non comp Documentary Premieres category.

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available. TBD (domestic). TBD (international)

[related]2015 Sundance Film Festival Predictions[/related]