Tag: American Indie Film
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #85. Babak Anvari – Transgression
Another Sundance alumni who broke out big at the fest with Under the Shadow, Babak Anvari quickly lined up a pair of projects with...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #84. Scott Z. Burns – The Torture Report
It would be kind of neat to see Scott Z. Burns premiere his directorial debut at the same time as his frequent collaborator Steven...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #83. Martha Stephens – To the Stars
Martha Stephens' fourth feature film follows in the footsteps of Land Ho! (Sundance '14). With filming having taken place in May, starring Shea Whigham, Malin Akerman,...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #82. Lynn Shelton – Sword of Trust
A project she likens to her 2009 film Humpday, described as an improvisational type of production, Lynn Shelton's eighth feature film in Sword of...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #81. J.D. Dillard – Sweetheart
The only J.D. Dillard related news to drop in 2018 was that he co-wrote Joe Sill’s directorial debut project Stray. Another tight-lipped Blumhouse production...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #80. Carlo Mirabella-Davis – Swallow
After a false start of sorts, Carlo Mirabella-Davis will finally be premiering the France-US co-production and his directorial debut Swallow in 2019. His past...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #77. Hannah Pearl Utt – Stupid Happy
Moving from Disengaged the TV Series to Disengaged the feature, Hannah Pearl Utt received a helping hand (and so did producer Mallory Schwartz) for...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #76. Jennifer Kaytin Robinson – Someone Great
Considered ahead of its time, writer-director-producer Jennifer Kaytin Robinson parlayed her canceled MTV’s Sweet/Vicious gig into a directorial debut featuring the likes of Brittany Snow,...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #75. Josephine Decker – Shirley
Josephine Decker's Madeline's Madeline was next level for the filmmaker and so it was no surprise when she joined a project that was already in...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #74. Pippa Bianco – Share
In less than two weeks from now, we should be finding out what the final title is for Pippa Bianco's feature length version which...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #73. Selah and the Spades – Tayarisha Poe
Receiving a ton of support along the way, the micro-budgeted Selah and the Spades went into production this summer in Tayarisha Poe's backyard of...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #72. David Gutnik – Russian American
Brooklyn-born and based David Gutnik has been chipping away at Russian American (formerly Brighton Beach) since 2016, with post perhaps being further delayed because...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #70. Gideon Raff – The Red Sea Diving Resort
Perhaps in the same programming methodology as when Sundance included Brad Anderson's Beirut in their 2018 line-up, STX will get to launch Gideon Raff's...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #67. Keola Racela – Porno
Working in the short form and picking up Sundance film experiences by being an art dept. intern on David Gordon Green's Prince Avalanche and...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #64. Jacob Estes – Only You
Jacob Estes could be making it a Sundance trifecta with Mean Creek (2004) and The Details (2011) being joined Only You - a horror, sci-fi, thriller that...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #60. Michael Cristofer – The Night Clerk
While we commonly associate Sundance with youngling breakout talents, young-at-heart Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, screenwriter (Bonfire of the Vanities) and actor (most recently Evil...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #59. Rashid Johnson – Native Son
Perhaps the most alluring offering on A24's slate for 2019 is the ode to 1930's Chicago and African American identity debut film from conceptual...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #58. My Zoe – Julie Delpy
Her seventh feature film since 2002's Looking for Jimmy, Julie Delpy went into production My Zoe back in May in Berlin and Moscow. Of...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #57. Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre – Mustang
Having gone into production in November of 2017 and not having a festival berth in 2018 meant that the Sundance 2019 was part of...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #56. Sia – Music
After blasting a whole bunch of originality in the texts found Brady Corbet's Vox Lux, I'm ready for a second helping of film-based creativity...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #55. Rick Alverson – The Mountain
There are a slew of festival preemed goodies in Her Smell, Birds of Passage, Donnybrook, High Life, Gloria Bell, Fistful of Dirt and even Errol...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #52. Matt Aselton – Lying and Stealing
You'd been forgiven if you've forgotten the name of Matt Aselton who, a decade earlier, made his directorial debut with Gigantic - a film...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #50. Julius Onah – Luce
Part of his "American Lives" output, production on Luce took place in November of 2017 and becomes Julius Onah's third feature following in the footsteps of the...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #49. Peter Sattler – Love & Oatmeal
Peter Sattler could very well be making a return trip to Sundance following up 2014's Camp X-Ray (we called it a remarkable screenwriting and...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #48. Casey Affleck – Light of My Life
Post Manchester by the Sea, in February of 2017, Casey Affleck began filming Light of My Life in British Columbia’s Okanagan valley. Significantly slowing...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #47. Robert Eggers – The Light House
Robert Pattinson recently admitted that filming on The Light House was "the closest I’ve come to punching a director". Not exactly Kinski-Herzog in nature, but we...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #46. Joe Talbot – Last Black Man in San Francisco
Perhaps making the leap from former short filmmaker alumni (2017's American Paradise) to debuting his directorial debut, Sundance are not the only ones to...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #45. Jennifer Reeder – Knives and Skin
An artist and film fest circuit habitual, filmmaker Jennifer Reeder's looks to be moving out of the short film sphere (the Sundance selected 2014 short A...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #44. Dan Krauss – The Kill Team
Who better to adapt non-fic to fiction than .... the filmmaker himself. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the Tribeca...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #41. Taika Waititi – Jojo Rabbit
A longstanding friend of the festival (I think I've walked by him three dozen times at the HQ in Park City), Taika Waititi might...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #39. Jonathan Helpert – IO
2018 came and will have went and IO will not have dropped. Perhaps there is a lot more after effect works demanded for this...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #38. Rania Attieh & Daniel Garcia – Initials S.G.
Recently featuring their film at the American Film Festival's US In Progress in Wroclaw, the team of Rania Attieh and Daniel Garcia look to...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #34. Stephen Gurewitz – Honky Kong
Apart from a work in progress industry screening in Wroclaw during the American Film Fest in 2017, there is very little info on Stephen...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #33. Alma Har’el – Honey Boy
A fruitful creative collab that began with a music vid for Sigur Rós and added support for her sophomore film LoveTrue, Alma Har’el and...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #32. Steven Soderbergh – High Flying Bird
Taking a page not from Sean Baker, but from his own proclivity to shoot on the format which best suits the narrative's needs, Steven...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #30. Nabil Elderkin – Gully
An American photographer, turned music video director turned filmmaker who found fortune via a peculiar Kanye West encounter, American-Iranian Nabil Elderkin (who was among...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #27. Josh Trank – Fonzo
It's time to say goodbye to the De Niro Capone touch from The Untouchables. A meatier, bulkier project that would certainly rev up Sundance audiences,...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #25. Joe Berlinger – Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile
After being a no-show among fests in 2018, it looks like Joe Berlinger's Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile is poised for a Park...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #24. Craig Roberts – Eternal Beauty
Not really the dark horse pick selection that was his feature debut, actor Craig Roberts has been to the fest beforehand (Richard Ayoade’s Submarine...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #23. Wash Westmoreland – The Earthquake Bird
Working once again with what might be a strong female protagonist and adapted source material, Wash Westmoreland boarded The Earthquake Bird in August of 2016 and production...
2019 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: #22. Andrew Ahn – Driveways
After the critically acclaimed Spa Night, (2016 Sundance Film Fest selection) Andrew Ahn moved into the television sphere with a half dozen episodes of This...
At Eternity’s Gate | Review
Pigments of Your Imagination: Inside Van Gogh’s Mind
Julian Schnabel’s aesthetically-spellbinding Vincent Van Gogh biopic, At Eternity’s Gate, places viewers inside the Dutch artist’s eye....
Video: Vladimir de Fontenay’s Mobile Homes – 2017 Cannes Film Fest Post Screening Q&A
Vladimir de Fontenay premiered his debut film Mobile Homes in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2017 Cannes Film Fest. Here is his post...
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs | Review
Six of the West: Coen Bros. Release Minor, Uneven Collection of Frontier Short Stories
In thinking about the anthology form in cinema, Joel and Ethan...
A Private War | Review
War is War is War: Heineman Tackles the Controversial Marie Colvin in Narrative Debut
Oscar nominated documentarian Matthew Heineman (2015’s Cartel Land), follows up recent...
Her Old Joy: Kelly Reichardt Finds Oregon by Way of China in “First Cow”
When Todd Haynes introduced Kelly Reichardt to the work of Jonathan Raymond, it was the page turning exercise of The Half Life that set...
Nancy | 2018 Warsaw International Film Festival Review
Out of the Void: Chloe Embarks on Nuanced, Complex Search for Human Warmth
In Christina Choe’s first feature, Andrea Riseborough gives a subtle performance as...
Video Interview: Elizabeth Chomko – What They Had
Compassionate, introspective and quietly in your face, What They Had makes a case for coming to terms....on your own terms. Films where the focal...
What They Had | Review
Tragedy + Comedy = Family: Chomko’s Unforgettable Alzheimer's Story
In a year where so many films feel politically charged, What They Had is a refreshingly...
Interview: Jim Cummings – Thunder Road
He first came to our attention as one of the producers on Patrick Wang's The Grief of Others and Trey Edward Shults' Krisha, but...
