Simply as final yr, over 60 movies are coming into this yr’s Sundance Movie Competition searching for properties. However after a sluggish 2023, 2024 proved to be a powerful yr for unbiased movie, with some sudden patrons getting concerned, Netflix getting aggressive and spending one of many largest quantities in Sundance historical past, and the general well being of the market transferring at an excellent tempo. This yr suggests much more distributors may get artistic.
Under we’ll replace all of the acquisitions out of the pageant as they arrive. Listed below are the flicks we predict may promote huge.
“The Actuality of Hope”
Part: Documentary Brief Movie Program
Purchaser: Asteria and Documentary+
Director: Joe Looking
Buzz: Forward of its premiere on Saturday, Jan. 25, AI animation studio Asteria and the documentary free streaming platform Documentary+ swooped in to amass this doc quick that blends VR and stay motion filmmaking. The movie follows Hiyu, a digital actuality world builder based mostly in Stockholm who’s affected by kidney failure and is about to get a transplant from a buddy, New York-based Photographotter, who he is aware of solely by means of an internet VR neighborhood the place they’re every seen as an animal “furry” avatar. Doc+ will launch the movie later this yr on its AVOD platform and thru its numerous FAST channels. Asteria’s Bryn Mooser and Justin Lacob are becoming a member of the mission as government producers.
“One to One: John and Yoko”
Part: Highlight
Purchaser: Magnolia
Director: Kevin MacDonald
Buzz: First premiering on the Venice Movie Competition after which at Telluride, Magnolia purchased “One to One” simply forward of its Sundance screening and made a splash to offer it an IMAX unique launch on April 11, the primary time Magnolia has partnered with IMAX on a launch. It should then land on Max and HBO in late 2025. The movie follows the 18 months that John Lennon and Yoko Ono spent dwelling in Greenwich Village within the early Nineteen Seventies, together with restored footage from the one full live performance Lennon carried out after breaking apart from The Beatles, the One to One Madison Sq. Backyard profit live performance. The movie has an audio restoration as overseen by Sean Lennon Ono.
Movies Arriving with Distribution
“2000 Meters to Andriivka”
Part: World Documentary
Distributor: Frontline/Related Press
Director: Mstyslav Chernov
Buzz: The director of “20 Days in Mariupol” returns with a movie wherein he embeds himself with a Ukrainian platoon slowly realizing that the Russian marketing campaign could also be seemingly infinite.
“The Alabama Answer”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: HBO Documentary Movies
Director: Andrew Jarecki
Buzz: The “Capturing the Friedmans” director examines a cover-up inside considered one of America’s deadliest jail methods.
“April”
Part: Highlight
Distributor: Metrograph Movies
Director: Dea Kulumbegashvili
Buzz: The movie about girls’s rights from the Georgian filmmaker received the jury prize eventually yr’s Venice and can open from Metrograph, fittingly, in April.
“The Ballad of Wallis Island”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: Focus Options
Director: James Griffiths
Solid: Tom Basden, Carey Mulligan, Tim Key, Sian Clifford, Akemnji Ndifornyen
Buzz: Basden and Key are longtime comedy companions reuniting with a candy, tuneful movie a couple of lottery winner who will get considered one of his previous favourite duos to reunite for a non-public live performance.
“Deaf President Now!”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: Apple Studios
Director: Nyle DiMarco and Davis Guggenheim
Buzz: The “Deaf U” producer groups with the “Nonetheless” director for a narrative concerning the 1988 protest at Deaf school Gallaudet College.
“Enigma”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: HBO Documentary Movies
Director: Zackary Drucker
Buzz: The director of “The Stroll” returns to Sundance with this profile of mannequin Amanda Lear and April Ashley, the girl who claimed Lear labored along with her in Parisian transgender revues within the ’50s.
“If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: A24
Director: Mary Bronstein
Solid: Rose Byrne, A$AP Rocky, Conan O’Brien, Danielle McDonald
Buzz: The director of “Yeast” makes her sophomore characteristic with this darkly comedic, uncomfortably humorous movie a couple of lady’s hostile relationship along with her therapist.
“The Legend of Ochi”
Part: Household Matinee
Distributor: A24
Director: Isaiah Saxon
Solid: Helena Zengel, Finn Wolfhard, Emily Watson, Willem Dafoe,
Buzz: This A24 household fantasy journey movie makes use of elaborate and meticulously crafted puppetry and work (not AI!) to inform an environmental parable.
“Magic Farm”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: MUBI
Director: Amalia Ullman
Solid: Chloe Sevigny, Alex Wolff, Simon Rex
Buzz: The director of “El Planeta” returns to Sundance with this English-language satire about media a movie crew that travels to Argentina for a profile, solely to wind up within the incorrect nation.
“Opus”
Part: Midnight
Distributor: A24
Director: Mark Anthony Inexperienced
Solid: Ayo Edebiri, John Malkovich, Juliette Lewis, Murray Bartlett, Amber Midthunder
Buzz: Mark Anthony Inexperienced’s debut characteristic is a horror movie a couple of younger journalist invited to go to a compound of a pop star who mysteriously disappeared 30 years earlier.
“Sally”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: Nat Geo
Director: Cristina Costantini
Buzz: The director of “Mucho Mucho Amor” and “Science Truthful directs this profile of Sally Journey, the primary American feminine astronaut to make it to area, and her secret romance.
“Sly Lives! (aka The Burden of Black Genius)
Part: Premieres
Distributor: Onyx Collective
Director: Questlove
Buzz: 4 years after Questlove had a record-breaking Sundance sale for a documentary, Questlove is again with a documentary about Sly and the Household Stone chief Sly Stone.
“The Wedding ceremony Banquet”
Part: Premieres
Distributor: Bleecker Avenue
Director: Andrew Ahn
Solid: Bowen Yang, Lily Gladstone, Kelly Marie Tran
Buzz: The “Fireplace Island” filmmaker’s newest movie is a comedy a couple of man who exchanges a inexperienced card marriage for an costly IVF process, solely to be stunned with an elaborate Korean wedding ceremony ceremony.