Festival Predictions

2021 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Julian Higgins’ God’s Country

Published on November 18, 2020

Los Angeles based filmmaker Julian Higgins (a past Student Academy Award winner) began tinkering around with the long form of his current project with a 2015 short Winter Light – based on James Lee Burke’s short story. After a paying gig in television’s Guidance, this past February Higgins took to the epoque friendly backdrop of Montana for a neo-Western thriller starring Thandie Newton. God’s Country was recently included in Film Music and Sound Design Lab at the Sundance Institute.

Gist: Written by Shaye Ogbonna, Newton plays a grieving college professor living on her own at the edge of the national forest. One day she confronts two hunters trespassing on her land, triggering a battle of wills with dangerous ramifications.

Production Co./Producers: Cold Iron’s CEO Miranda Bailey, Amanda Marshall, Halee Bernard, Julian Higgins.

Prediction: NEXT

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available.

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).