By Jake Skubish

As a film buff, attending the Sundance Film Festival has long been high on my bucket list. This year I finally got to do it, but unfortunately it was without leaving my house: for the first time the festival went virtual. The loss of the in-person atmosphere and the momentum it can give indie films looking for distribution is a genuine tragedy. But there’s an upside to the format change, too: the festival is accessible to people around the world who wouldn’t otherwise be able to watch these films. So while I still hope to get to Park City at some point in my life, I’m grateful to be able to check out these movies from home.

Sundance is known as the unofficial start to the movie year, and the launching pad for some of the most beloved films of recent years (Get Out, Call Me By Your Name, The Big Sick, The Farewell, and many others). While this year’s lineup was somewhat pared down, it still contained plenty of gems that I’m sure will dominate the conversation in 2021. Here’s a rundown of everything I saw at Sundance 2021, and what you should be looking forward to most.

Coda

Apple broke the record for Sundance purchases when it bought CODA for $25 million, and watching the movie it’s easy to understand why: CODA is the sort of feel-good coming-of-age story that all types of audiences are going to love. The film stars Emilia Jones as Ruby, the only hearing member of a deaf family that runs a fishing business in the Boston area. Torn between the family business and her passion for singing, Ruby is forced to navigate the process of becoming her own person. It’s completely endearing, has a ton of great musical moments, and features a star-making performance from Jones. Look out for it on Apple TV+ at some point this year.

Rating: 3.5/5

Cusp

Cusp falls into the lineage of documentaries like 2018’s Minding the Gap: portraits of restless youth, balancing the freedom of the present with the uncertainty of the future. The film follows three teenage girls in Texas at a transitional period in their adolescent lives, reaching for adulthood but not quite arriving there yet.

Where Minding the Gap was highly stylized, however, Cusp is much more vérité. There are no talking head interviews or sweeping montages; the documentary plays like a lightly edited video essay. The style can work in the film’s favor at times, giving us the sense of intimate access, but also reinforces just how directionless it can be.

That’s not to say Cusp doesn’t have specific ideas. Directors Isabel Bethencourt and Parker Hill present a deliberate push and pull between the freedom these girls feel and the danger presented to them by the lecherous men around them. Cusp is a wayward, searching project, but so are its protagonists, and it’s an engaging look into a tenuous moment in life.

Rating: 3/5

Homeroom

Last year’s Sundance breakout documentary was Boys State, a look at the annual week-long mock government event at the Texas Capitol. Although it contained glimmers of hope, Boys State was mostly a damning look at the nastiness of American politics. Consider Homeroom the anti-Boys State: it centers on a group of deeply inspirational high schoolers working tirelessly to make the world a better place.

Homeroom takes place in Oakland and tracks a high school graduating class through the 2019-2020 school year. The film starts with a focus on student leaders’ efforts to defund the sizable police presence in their school district. In the latter half COVID-19 arrives and throws the school year into disarray. What makes Homeroom special is its ability to make clear that when the pandemic started, the struggle did not stop. The world never really went on pause if you spent your time seeking a new path forward. This movie makes me believe in one.

Rating: 4.5/5

How It Ends

The problem with most of the awful “pandemic-era content” thrown our way throughout the past year has been films’ acquiescence to the visual limitations of the circumstances. “Let’s make a Zoom movie!” is the sort of idea that only replicates the bummer of a time I already know I’m living through.

Zoe Lister-Jones’ How It Ends follows a woman named Liza as she makes her way toward a party during the last day on Earth. The film is obviously a product of the pandemic; actors spend all their time outdoors with one another, and socially distanced. It’s much more visually expansive, however, than most of the COVID content to which we’ve been subjected. It’s not a cinematic knockout; Lister-Jones clearly made the film on a shoestring. But it’s a charming tale of self-love, with a string of cameos from famous people you love (Olivia Wilde’s bit is my favorite). Lister-Jones is a real talent, and I look forward to seeing what she’s able to direct once we’re out of this mess.

Rating: 3.5/5

Knocking

Knocking stars Cecilia Milocco as Molly, a woman recently released from a psychiatric ward who breaks down when she hears a mysterious knocking sound in her new apartment. With this premise I was expecting Knocking to be sinister or chaotic, but the film is a slow burn. Rather than delighting in the spectacle of Molly’s mental descent, you find yourself on board with her search for the source of the noise, and never doubting her belief in its origin. I don’t mean to suggest that the film’s sympathy for its protagonist is a problem, but Knocking does suffer from a lack of doubt in her motives: Molly has a theory about what’s causing the noise and … I pretty much believed her, which makes the whole exercise a lot less intriguing. Milocco gives a fine performance, but Knocking is ultimately a dull watch.

Rating: 2/5

Mayday

Mayday kicks off with a routine day at work for Ana (Grace Van Patten), complete with the typical misogyny and disrespect from her male higher-ups. A strange electrical shortage at work, however, takes the film to a literal metaphor for these hostile relationships: Ana finds herself transported to a world where men and women are engaged in a never-ending war.

In this way Mayday might sound a bit on the nose, and for its first half that’s true. But as Ana starts to doubt the mission of the combat, the film makes an unexpected departure. Where it lands is too unspecific to be insightful, but the journey is buoyed by deft world-building from first-time feature director Karen Cinorre. What really makes Mayday worth watching, though, is the two performances at its center. Mia Goth is a delight as the leader of the combatant women, and after a completely different performance in Emma last year, she’s a name to keep an eye on. As Ana, Van Patten proves that she has movie star potential. I took her in the Movie Star Draft, and I am 1000% confident that she is going to be a star.

Rating: 3/5

On the Count of Three

The worst movie I saw at Sundance, On the Count of Three stars Jerrod Carmichael, who is also making his directorial debut with the film. He plays Val, who along with his best friend Kevin (Christopher Abbott) makes a pact: by the end of the day, they will kill each other. Both see their lives going nowhere, have suffered from trauma, and don’t see any reason to carry on.

On the Count of Three is trapped by its premise from the get-go: either follow through and glorify suicide or don’t and have Val and Kevin learn a predictable lesson about the meaning of life. Carmichael tries to chart a path down the middle and ends up accomplishing nothing. Abbott turns in a nice performance, but the film is visually stale and leaves you with nothing to think about once its brief 84-minute runtime is over.

Rating: 1/5

Passing

Passing is brilliant, and only grows in my estimation the more I reflect on it. The film is based on a 1929 novel by Nella Larsen, which follows two childhood friends who reunite and becomes increasingly entangled in one another’s lives. One, Irene (Tessa Thompson), is a Black woman with a Black husband and children. The other, Clare (Ruth Negga), is a Black woman with a white husband, and a secret: she’s passing as white, and her bigoted husband has no idea.

Passing digs into the web of desires between Irene and Clare: what they have, what they don’t, and what they want. The film wrestles with the need to be seen and heard, and what’s justified in achieving it.

It’s all presented in a sumptuous black-and-white frame from first-time director Rebecca Hall, who shows as much control behind the camera as she has in her performances in front of them. Thompson is great as always, but the star of the show is Negga, who delivers an absolute knockout performance. Depending on the timing of Passing’s wide release, I expect Negga to earn some award consideration.

Rating: 4/5

Summer of Soul (…or, When the Revolution Could not be televised)

Summer of Soul is the directorial debut of Ahmir-Khalib Thompson, better known as Questlove. It’s also a total joy. The documentary highlights the power of the Harlem Cultural Festival, a massive concert series that took place the same summer as Woodstock but didn’t receive a shred of media attention.

Thompson makes a wise choice in crafting Summer of Soul: he lets the footage do most of the work. When you have previously unseen performances from Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, and other giants of music history, it’s best to simply marvel at their genius.

Summer of Soul is not a strict concert doc, though. Thompson expertly weaves in history of the era with each subsequent performance without ever having the film feel like it’s getting sidetracked. It’s the perfect blend of historical corrective and historical celebration, and I can’t wait to rewatch it.

Rating: 4/5

Wild Indian

Wild Indian is the debut of Native American director Lyle Mitchell Corbine Jr., and his film is set up from the beginning as a parable for the suffering of Native people. The movie stars Michael Greyeyes as Makwa, a man who was abused in his youth and committed an inexplicable act of violence as a result. Satisfied with his integration into white America as an adult, his path is contrasted with Teddo, a childhood friend who helped Makwa cover up his crime and remains haunted by it.

Greyeyes is a presence on screen, but there’s only so much he can do to carry this haphazard story. The inciting incident of Wild Indian arises quickly and then quickly disappears, and as an adult we don’t see much change from Makwa; he’s a damaged individual, through and through. The film’s tone is incredibly dour, and combined with a thin story, it’s an unsuccessful feature.

Rating: 2/5

Highlights from the (virtual) Sundance Film Festival

Coda

Cusp

Homeroom

How It Ends

Knocking

Mayday

On the Count of Three

Passing

Summer of Soul (…or, When the Revolution Could not be televised)

Wild Indian