We’ve all been alone inside our heads a lot recently, and the question “why am I having weird dreams” has reportedly surged as a Google search over the past year. Natalia Almada’s “Users,” which won the directing award for U.S. Documentary in Sundance, is perhaps best appreciated as one of those peculiarly vivid dreams. Like them, it is made of uncanny imagery and strange echoey mood. But also like them, it comes apart under the scrutiny of the more logical, waking mind, and dissipates quickly in daylight.
In the beginning there’s a baby, being rocked in a mechanical crib. The baby is crying, then quiets, then falls asleep, and as this is an infant not yet capable of artifice or performance, it’s a fascinatingly unfakeable sequence to watch play out in real time. All the while a voice muses at us, apparently from a future...
In the beginning there’s a baby, being rocked in a mechanical crib. The baby is crying, then quiets, then falls asleep, and as this is an infant not yet capable of artifice or performance, it’s a fascinatingly unfakeable sequence to watch play out in real time. All the while a voice muses at us, apparently from a future...
- 2/20/2021
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
While we’ve seen a race in Hollywood to option a fictionalized version of the Reddit traders who rocked Wall Street with their investing in the “meme stock” GameStop, a new documentary is also in the works about the online traders on Reddit’s r/WallStreetBets.
The documentary studios Xtr and The Optimist are developing a feature documentary film about the ongoing “short squeeze movement,” which over the last few days has caused GameStop stock prices to surge and send more traditional hedge funds that were shorting the stock into a panic.
The untitled documentary film was in part funded by a Kickstarter campaign and is already undergoing interviews with key players of the movement, even as the story continues to unfold.
The Optimist’s Chris Temple and Zach Ingrasci, who are known for last year’s immigration documentary “Five Years North,” will direct the film about how the GameStop...
The documentary studios Xtr and The Optimist are developing a feature documentary film about the ongoing “short squeeze movement,” which over the last few days has caused GameStop stock prices to surge and send more traditional hedge funds that were shorting the stock into a panic.
The untitled documentary film was in part funded by a Kickstarter campaign and is already undergoing interviews with key players of the movement, even as the story continues to unfold.
The Optimist’s Chris Temple and Zach Ingrasci, who are known for last year’s immigration documentary “Five Years North,” will direct the film about how the GameStop...
- 2/5/2021
- by Brian Welk
- The Wrap
Chicago – The 2021 Sundance Film Festival will be long remembered as the “virtual” version due to the pandemic, but there are always the real films, and the festival announced their competition honorees on February 2nd, in a virtual ceremony hosted by comedian Patton Oswalt.
After six days, 73 feature films and 50 Short Films, the Grand Jury Prizes were awarded to “Coda” (U.S. Dramatic) … Coda is an acronym for Child of Deaf Adults, and highlights the character of Ruby. “Summer of Soul” (U.S. Documentary) … the “Black Woodstock” of Harlem in the same Summer of 1969. “Flee” (World Cinema Documentary) … a child immigrant grows up to be a respected academic, but still harbors a secret. And “Hive” (World Cinema Dramatic) … a woman has a husband missing in action during the Kosovo war – should she continue to support herself or wait?
The list of all award winners are below.
Grand Jury Prize
Coda
Photo credit: Sundance Film Festival
U.
After six days, 73 feature films and 50 Short Films, the Grand Jury Prizes were awarded to “Coda” (U.S. Dramatic) … Coda is an acronym for Child of Deaf Adults, and highlights the character of Ruby. “Summer of Soul” (U.S. Documentary) … the “Black Woodstock” of Harlem in the same Summer of 1969. “Flee” (World Cinema Documentary) … a child immigrant grows up to be a respected academic, but still harbors a secret. And “Hive” (World Cinema Dramatic) … a woman has a husband missing in action during the Kosovo war – should she continue to support herself or wait?
The list of all award winners are below.
Grand Jury Prize
Coda
Photo credit: Sundance Film Festival
U.
- 2/3/2021
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
There are many stunning images flowing through “Users,” , but the one that resonates above them all is actually quite mundane: a grimy internet fiberoptic cable buried deep in the ocean that keeps the modern world connected. “Soon enough,” Almada intones in voiceover, “we will forget it’s even there.”
That underlying sense of awe and dread percolates through the duration of Almada’s audacious fourth feature. A far cry from the more conventional non-fiction portraits of Mexican life in “The Night Watchmen” and “The General,” Almada has crafted a hypnotic, visually-driven work in the tradition of “Baraka” and “Koyaanisqatsi” for the digital age, replete with an immersive score by Kronos Quartet and Dolby Atmos sound design.
Unlike those freewheeling, montage-based works, however, “Users” is fused together by Almada’s pensive, lyrical voiceover throughout, which injects personal stakes into a roving assemblage of cinematic landscapes that make your average Terrence Malick vision quest feel downright grounded.
That underlying sense of awe and dread percolates through the duration of Almada’s audacious fourth feature. A far cry from the more conventional non-fiction portraits of Mexican life in “The Night Watchmen” and “The General,” Almada has crafted a hypnotic, visually-driven work in the tradition of “Baraka” and “Koyaanisqatsi” for the digital age, replete with an immersive score by Kronos Quartet and Dolby Atmos sound design.
Unlike those freewheeling, montage-based works, however, “Users” is fused together by Almada’s pensive, lyrical voiceover throughout, which injects personal stakes into a roving assemblage of cinematic landscapes that make your average Terrence Malick vision quest feel downright grounded.
- 2/3/2021
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
“When we dreamed this idea, this is what we dreamed, but you all made it a reality,” said Sundance Festival Director Tabitha Jackson during the introduction to this evening’s 2021 Sundance Film Festival awards ceremony. Like the festival, the ceremony was a smoothly running virtual one, connecting the at-home Sundance directors and programmers with the filmmakers similarly ensconced around the world director Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, All Light, Everywhere director Theo Anthony and Users director Natalia Almada, respectively, in a car on his way to […]
The post Coda, Summer of Soul Take Top Prizes at The 2021 Sundance Film Festival Awards first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Coda, Summer of Soul Take Top Prizes at The 2021 Sundance Film Festival Awards first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 2/3/2021
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
“When we dreamed this idea, this is what we dreamed, but you all made it a reality,” said Sundance Festival Director Tabitha Jackson during the introduction to this evening’s 2021 Sundance Film Festival awards ceremony. Like the festival, the ceremony was a smoothly running virtual one, connecting the at-home Sundance directors and programmers with the filmmakers similarly ensconced around the world director Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, All Light, Everywhere director Theo Anthony and Users director Natalia Almada, respectively, in a car on his way to […]
The post Coda, Summer of Soul Take Top Prizes at The 2021 Sundance Film Festival Awards first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Coda, Summer of Soul Take Top Prizes at The 2021 Sundance Film Festival Awards first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 2/3/2021
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
The narrative feature “Coda” and the documentary “Summer of Soul” swept the top categories at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, winning the Grand Jury Prizes and also taking the audience awards in the U.S. dramatic and documentary competitions.
“Coda,” director Sian Heder’s coming-of-age story in which Emilia Jones plays the only hearing member of a deaf family, also won an award for its ensemble, many of them deaf actors who performed in ASL. Its wins come three days after the film set a record for the largest sale in Sundance history, a $25 million deal with Apple.
“Summer of Soul,” which like “Coda” screened on the festival’s opening night, is a documentary by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson built around long-unseen concert footage from the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a six-weekend event that first-time director Questlove uses as a launching pad to explore race relations and Black culture in that tumultuous time.
“Coda,” director Sian Heder’s coming-of-age story in which Emilia Jones plays the only hearing member of a deaf family, also won an award for its ensemble, many of them deaf actors who performed in ASL. Its wins come three days after the film set a record for the largest sale in Sundance history, a $25 million deal with Apple.
“Summer of Soul,” which like “Coda” screened on the festival’s opening night, is a documentary by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson built around long-unseen concert footage from the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a six-weekend event that first-time director Questlove uses as a launching pad to explore race relations and Black culture in that tumultuous time.
- 2/3/2021
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Sundance Institute CEO Keri Putnam was a giant anime character. Filmmaker Rodney Ascher looked like a pink mummy. Near the bar, a blue-hued actor towered over a group of avatars, dressed as the Greek god Zeus, and taught the crowd how to fly.
These were among the sights at the first-ever IndieWire chili party in VR. For years, this site hosted a casual gathering at our condo for festival crowds, from programmers to filmmakers and executives eager to grab some casual face time away from the insanity of Main Street. While the chili party tradition went dormant in recent years, its legacy endured and Sundance’s virtual 2021 status created a new opportunity to help industry folks eager for new ways to hang out. This time, the only barrier to entry was a headset.
The event took place January 30 inside a virtual space created on the social platform VRchat. IndieWire joined...
These were among the sights at the first-ever IndieWire chili party in VR. For years, this site hosted a casual gathering at our condo for festival crowds, from programmers to filmmakers and executives eager to grab some casual face time away from the insanity of Main Street. While the chili party tradition went dormant in recent years, its legacy endured and Sundance’s virtual 2021 status created a new opportunity to help industry folks eager for new ways to hang out. This time, the only barrier to entry was a headset.
The event took place January 30 inside a virtual space created on the social platform VRchat. IndieWire joined...
- 2/3/2021
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
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