The Films I'm Most Excited to See at Sundance 2023

If you don't know who writer/director John Carney is, stop what you're doing & catch ONCE (later turned into a successful Broadway musical), BEGIN AGAIN, or SING STREET. Carney treats the love of creating music the way Nick Hornby treats consuming music or sports, with infinite enthusiasm, understanding, & pleasure. The film also stars Eve Hewson an actress long overdue for a breakout role.

ANTIVIRAL, director Brandon Cronenberg's very creepy, weirdly prescient 2012 feature film debut still haunts me (there's a scene with a cake pan I want scrubbed out of my head). POSSESSOR, his 2020 film, still unnerves me. I can't wait to see how he's going to ruin the scant few hours of sleep we get in Park City. Thanks in advance Cronenberg.

As a longtime fan of the Indigo Girls (Amy Ray & Emily Saliers) I think I can weather a warts-and-all documentary about their lives and music.

Alden Ehrenreich has had a bunch of false starts but he's the real thing, whether as the eponymous SOLO or the struggling actor in HAIL, CAESAR! Phoebe Dynevor became immensely famous overnight (if you call a nine-year-career before that "overnight"). Chloe Domont has honed her skill in some very good TV, including BILLIONS. Sundance doesn't normally program "genre"-type films so this must be killer.

Emilia Jones, yes, the young sensation from CODA (and sadly overlooked last awards season) in a film directed by Susanna Fogel, the co-writer of BOOKSMART and director of LIFE PARTNERS sounds like an intriguing next step for both of them.

I adored Holofcener's ENOUGH SAID, which also starred Dreyfus and the excellent, late James Gandolfini. This writer/director seems to be going in the opposite direction of Tarantino's 10-films edict (all a great director has in him/her is 10 films) and is getting better as the years go by.

It's not the presence of Gael Garcia Bernal that draws me to this film (though he, of course, counts). It's the director Roger Ross Williams, who made the gorgeous documentary, LIFE ANIMATED, one of my favorite films in 2016. Can't wait to see him stretch his legs with a feature narrative picture.

Entertaining and uplifting, even in the face of tragedy. Will it somehow avoid hagiography? Can it? Will it allow me to set aside all of my pre-conceived, likely-wrong assumptions of someone I don't know but admire for nothing more than being in things I liked? Maybe STILL doesn't need to. Maybe you should meet your heroes, if only in a bio-doc.

The director, Finley, also did WECRASHED & the not-yet cult classic THOROUGHBREDS. The cast? Kylie Rogers played the heartbreaking Young Beth on YELLOWSTONE & William Jackson Harper is, well, Chidi from THE GOOD PLACE. And they have Tiffany Haddish who is a bolt of life-energy in anything, even when it's bad.

There's a lot to skewer about couples trying to conceive and doing all the trendy things that you're "supposed" to do. Barthes did the sometimes effective, sometimes not COLD SOULS in 2009 and returns to the futuristic world of doctors and healing here.

I was 16 when I attended my first Willie Nelson Picnic in the now-demolished Joe Albi Stadium in Spokane, WA. I was not prepared for bikers nor the immense amount of skunky-smelling cigarettes. But once Willie started up we were all just one big miasma of dopey admiration. I'm still a fan and can't wait to step in the stadium once again.

All the Hatha-haters have had to have gotten jobs by now right? Or they adopted a rescue dog? They're otherwise occupied now, right? Good, then we can watch this complicated, discerning & brave actress in peace, accompanied by McKenzie, an actress who brings a new level of magnetism to stillness, & Oldroyd who directed the well-received LADY MACBETH. They're backed by a roster of top-shelf character actors: the always reliable Shea Whigham, Jefferson White ("Jimmy" from YELLOWSTONE), Marin Ireland (also a Taylor Sheridan grad from HELL OR HIGH WATER) & Owen Teague.

I keep hoping that this ONE, THIS one, will make Eugenio Derbez a household name. Okay, CODA, playing the strict but loving music/chorus teacher?...Nope...Well, shoot, hope it's RADICAL.

Adèle Exarchopoulos is one of the most daring actresses working today. Franz Rogowski is one of our most intriguing actors. Those are the "pros" here. The "con," for me at least, is that there have been very few Ira Sachs films that I've been able to stand. Here's hoping that I regret writing that after loving PASSAGES.

Yes, this is the 2nd Emilia Jones movie on this list but this film is here because I've been a fan of Scoot McNairy since 2010 when I saw him in MONSTERS at TIFF. I keep waiting for the general public to get to appreciate him too. Perhaps this film will do it?

I'm a sucker for road-trip movies and any comedy that can make it into the Dramatic Competition. Also, it's directed by the affable, talented Randall Park and based on a book, not something that's been workshopped to death. Check, check, check.

Dripping with talent this also includes Patti Harrison, unduly overlooked in TOGETHER, TOGETHER, an unduly overlooked rom-com from 2021's Sundance.

Reportedly based upon a true story this could be the COP CAR of this year.

It's safe to say that Jonathan Majors is the man of the moment so what enticed him to do this indie? Director Bynum's last film was HOT SUMMER NIGHTS, a coming-of-age flick with an unknown, gangly kid named Timothée Chalamet.

I saw a rough cut of this in December. When asked by the publicist to give notes I said: "I already have a favorite documentary of 2023 and it’s not even 2023 yet!"