Slamdance

Must See at SLAMDANCE

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Sylka, Bruno Clairefond and Alain Guillot in THE KEY at Slamdance Film Festival. Courtesy of HTTH Productions.

The 32nd Slamdance Film Festival opens tomorrow in LA, unveiling the work of new filmmakers. Christopher Nolan, Bong Joon-ho and Sean Baker are among the filmmakers whose early work was showcased at Slamdance; will another cinema icon emerge from this year’s program?

Here’s my Slamdance festival preview. I’ve had a chance to sample some of this year’s program and here are my recommendations.

MUST SEE

  • The Key: This offbeat French fable brings us unexpected characters and takes them into an even more unexpected world. Bruno and Alain, strangers to each other, are each, despite living in the middle of Paris, completely devoid of connection to other humans. Both the disagreeable, prickly Bruno and the more passive Alain remain essentially invisible to others – and anchored to a profound loneliness. The two are suddenly waylaid by a third man, Z, who invites them back to his place, which turns out to be one of those gloriously posh Parisian apartments, with high ceilings and a grand piano. The three new friends are getting to know each other when Z surprises them with a revelation that I won’t spoil. Fascinated, Alain and Bruno embrace Z’s highly unconventional lifestyle, but will it fulfill their lives? In his first narrative feature, writer-director Paul G. Sportiello explores what he calls “hidden people”. What makes a “nobody”? Is it a bad thing to be a nobody? Is it better to be comfortable in one’s own skin? Every aspect of this highly original storytelling serves to introduce Sportiello as an especially promising auteur. North American premiere at Slamdance.

OTHER SLAMDANCE HIGHLIGHTS

Manolya Maya in DUMP OF UNTITLED PIECES. Courtesy of Melik Kuru and Hafif Film.
  • Dump of Untitled Pieces: In this Turkish dark comedy, photography student Asli (Manolya Maya), a law school dropout, and her oddball roomie face eviction from their bohemian flat unless they can raise the rent money ASAP. They embark on a campaign to sell her portfolio to art dealers, careening through the the non-touristy neighborhoods of Istanbul and confronting the unwelcome realities of commerce (foreign buyers want tragedy). Their escapades are funny, but the humor in this first feature by writer-director Melik Kuru is primarily character-driven. Is the stubborn Asli an uncompromising artist or a slacker posing as an artist to avoid getting a real job? Kuru’s clever, surprise ending give us a clue. Beautifully shot in black-and-white in a cinéma vérité style by cinematographer Baris Aygen. North American premiere at Slamdance.
  • The Lemieurs: This cinéma vérité doc chronicles over a year in the lives of a Minnesota family as they meet the inevitabilities of life. Five middle-aged brothers must face the increasing frailty of their aged mother, while three cousins from the younger generation run the family’s funeral home. The stories of the family members are fittingly bookend by two funerals and anchored by the spirited matriarch. At once intimate and unsparingly clear-eyed, The Lemieurs is absorbing and brimming with humanity. First feature for director Sammy LeMieur. World premiere at Slamdance.

Slamdance festival passes are SOLD OUT, but you will be able to sample at least some of these films on the Slamdance Channel from February 24 thru March 6.

Discover the Newest Filmmakers at SLAMDANCE

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Sylka, Bruno Clairefond and Alain Guillot in THE KEY at Slamdance Film Festival. Courtesy of HTTH Productions.

It’s time for the 32nd Slamdance Film Festival, which is all about discovering new filmmakers and unveiling their work. Originating with 30 years in Utah, this is the second Slamdance in Los Angeles. It’s a hybrid festival with live events (February 10-25) and online via the Slamdance Channel (February 24-March 6). Three LA venues will host the screenings – DGA, Landmark Sunset, and 2220 Arts with the closing night ceremony held at the Egyptian Theater.

Slamdance was founded in 1995 by filmmakers reacting to the gatekeeper role and growing marketplace focus of a nearby Utah film festival with a similar name. Whenever I cover a film festival, I’m on the lookout for first films and world premieres – and here’s a festival essentially entirely made up of first films and world premieres.

Slamdance alumni include: Christopher Nolan (Oppenheimer, Memento, Dunkirk), Bong Joon-ho (Parasite), Benh Zeitlin (Beasts of the Southern Wild), Jeremy Saulnier (Blue Ruin, Green Room), Lynn Shelton (Outside In, Sword of Truth), Sean Baker (The Florida Project, Tangerine), Rian Johnson (Knives Out, Brick), Benny & Josh Safdie (Uncut Gems) and the Russo Brothers (Avengers: Infinity War).

All Slamdance feature films selected in the competition categories are directorial debuts without U.S. distribution, with budgets of less than $1 million. The 141 films in this year’s program, featuring 50 world premieres, hail from 50 countries and were selected from 10,000 submissions.

Slamdance opens with the world premiere of Alexandre Rockwell’s The Projectionist, a love letter to cinema starring Vondie Curtis-Hall and co-produced by Quentin Tarantino.

This year, Utopia will offer theatrical distribution for at least one Slamdance Grand Prize Winner. Way cool.

I’ll start rolling out full reviews of some Slamdance films on February 24th. Remember, even if you don’t get to the fest in LA, you can sample these films on the Slamdance Channel from February 24 thru March 6.

STARRING JERRY AS HIMSELF: more than an exposé

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In the documentary Starring Jerry as Himself, a Florida senior sees himself recruited as an operative by Chinese police. The story is told in a re-enactment with the subject playing himself. We later learn why the filmmakers chose re-enactment, and what could have been a conventional true crime exposé or a weeper, is illuminated by the subject family’s humanity.

Starring Jerry as Himself is the first feature for director Law Chen, who also edited, co-produced and shot some of the footage. Law Chen and his co-producer and subject Jonathan Hsu were responsible for the decision on how to structure the film. That decision turned what could have been a heartbreaking downer into an engaging and satisfying family story, albeit a cautionary one.

I highlighted Starring Jerry as Himself as a MUST SEE in my Slamdance: discovering new filmmakers, and it won Slamdance’s Documentary Feature Grand Jury Prize. It’s now available to stream at home from Amazon, AppleTV and YouTube.

THE COMPLEX FORMS: what did he bargain for?

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David Allen White in Fabio D’Orta’s THE COMPLEX FORMS. Courtesy of Slamdance.

The visually striking atmospheric The Complex Forms is set in a centuries-old Italian villa, where Christian (David Allen White) and other down-on-their-luck middle-aged men sell their bodies for a period of days to be “possessed”. Possessed how? By who or by what? As the dread builds, Christian resolves to pry the answers from the secretive masters of the villa.

Director Fabio D’Orta unspools the story with remarkably crisp black-and-white cinematography, a brooding soundtrack and impeccable editing. In his astonishingly impressive filmmaking debut, D’Orta wrote, directed, shot and edited The Complex Form.

David Allen White is excellent as Christian, who begins resigned to endure whatever process that he has committed to, but becomes increasingly uneasy as his probing questions are deflected. So are Michael Venni as Christian’s talkative roommate Luh and Cesare Bonomelli as the impassive roommate simply called The Giant.

Like his countrymen Fellini and Leona, D’Orta has a gift for using faces to heighten interest and tell the story. He makes especially effective use of Bonomelli’s Mt. Rushmore-like countenance.

I screened The Complex Forms for its United States premiere at Slamdance. The Complex Forms was my favorite Slamdance film and won the festival’s Honorable Mention for Narrative Feature.  The Complex Forms is playing Cinequest on March 12 and 13.

FOUL EVIL DEEDS: from not so bad to worse

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Photo caption: Alexander Perkins in Richard Hunter’s FOUL EVIL DEEDS. Courtesy of Slamdance.

The deadpan anthology FOUL EVIL DEEDS depicts a range of aberrant human behavior, most of it darkly funny. The deeds themselves arise from a wide variety of root causes:

  • a couple’s social clumsiness;
  • a loner’s inner rage;
  • some kids’ youthful stupidity;
  • one guy’s uncommon sexual need;
  • an otherwise upstanding dog-walker’s entitlement;
  • and one man filled with deep-seated, sociopathic evil.

The threads are woven together into a wry, clever and very cynical movie that veers to the misanthropic. The segment about a neighbor’s cat could have been written by Larry David about George Costanza.

Writer-director Richard Hunter’s debut feature is consciously an art film; Hunter says he is influenced by the work of Ulrich Seidl, Michael Haneke and Roy Andersson, and it shows. It’s a slow burn, and the audience wonders, why is that guy checking out the remote wooded wetland? (Hint: he’s looking to coverup a future evil deed.)

Hunter seems to be measuring human behavior by its impact on others. Some might still consider an unconventional sexual practice to be a “sin”, but it’s entirely victimless (and isn’t even illegal). In another thread, what is intended as a harmless practical joke becomes tragic.

Alexander Perkins is excellent as a man with anger management issues that he can’t shake. As a consequence, he is grinding his teeth through workaday drudgery, and he’s mad about that, too. Does he have a path out of his situation, or he just going to stew until he explodes? There’s only one person who he can talk to (Oengus MacNamara in an unexpectedly riveting performance).

I think that FOUL EVIL DEEDS is likely to secure US arthouse distribution. FOUL EVIL DEEDS It premiered at Locarno, and I screened FOUL EVIL DEEDS for its North American premiere at Slamdance.

Through March 7, 2025, you can stream FOUL EVIL DEEEDS on the Slamdance Slamdance Channel. A 2025 Slamdance Film Festival Virtual Pass, which brings you FOUL EVIL DEEDS and almost all of my Slamdance recommendations, only costs $50.

MEMORIES OF LOVE RETURNED: moments preserved

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Photo caption: MEMORIES OF LOVE RETURNED. Courtesy of Slamdance.

The fine documentary Memories of Love Returned is the result of an accidental meeting. On a 2002 trip to his native Uganda, actor Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine (Treme, The Chi, The Lincoln Lawyer) happened upon a rural studio portrait photographer named Kibaate. Over a span of decades, Kibaate had documented everyday people over decades in thousands of portrait, many of them stunningly evocative. Mwine helped Kibaate preserve his body of work, and, after Kibaate’s death 20 years later, organized a public showcase of Kibaate’s collection.

The revelation of the unknown Kibaate as an artistic genius, is a compelling enough story, but the exhibition prompts a complicated and sometimes awkward exploration of Kibaate’s siring a prodigious number of children with a bevy of surviving mothers. The filmmaker’s own health and family story takes Memories of Love Returned seamlessly into another direction, topped off by Kibaate’s documentation of Ugandan LGBTQ culture.

Memories of Love Returned is the second documentary feature directed by Mwine. Executive-produced by Steven Soderberrgh, the film has been piling up awards from film festivals. I screened Memories of Love Returned for Slamdance.

Through March 7, 2025, you can stream Memories of Love Returned on the Slamdance Slamdance Channel. A 2025 Slamdance Film Festival Virtual Pass, which brings you Memories of Love Returned and almost all of my Slamdance recommendations, only costs $50.

STOLEN KINGDOM: true crime with nerds

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A scene from STOLEN KINGDOM. Courtesy of Slamdance.

The documentary Stolen Kingdom uncovers a series of offbeat pastimes and their bizarre convergence. Of course, we’re already aware of Disney fans and collectors. Stolen Kingdom also reveals the world of urban explorers, who trespass into closed and abandoned buildings. They’re enjoying the thrill of being where they’re not supposed to be and gawking at what the public isn’t supposed to see.

In Stolen Kingdom, we meet people who sneak into closed theme park attractions and even some daredevils who jump off the rides while operating and mosey around backstage(see photo above). Those folks can be tempted by the black market in Disneyana. As the behavior escalates from pranks to larceny, we know that somebody’s going to get in big trouble, Centering on the theft of an obsolete animatron, Stolen Kingdom takes on the guise of a true crime story, but with the very nerdiest criminals.

A scene from STOLEN KINGDOM. Courtesy of Slamdance.

Stolen Kingdom is one of those documentaries about our fellow humans that make us shake our heads.

Stolen Kingdom is the first feature for director Joshua Bailey. I screened Stolen Kingdom for Slamdance, a week after its world premiere at the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival.

Through March 7, 2025, you can stream Stolen Kingdom on the Slamdance Slamdance Channel. A 2025 Slamdance Film Festival Virtual Pass, which brings you Stolen Kingdom and almost all of my Slamdance recommendations, only costs $50.

PORTAL TO HELL: Faust at the laundromat

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Photo caption: Trey Holland and Romina D’Ugo in Woody Bess’ PORTAL TO HELL. Courtesy of Portal to Hell LLC.

In the witty, dark comedy, Portal to Hell, a hangdog bill collector named Dunn (get it?) discovers a portal to hell, replete with hellfire and brimstone, in his local laundromat. Dunn, with best of intentions, strikes a bargain with its proprietor. Dunn is too nice for his wretched job, but just what is he capable of? And how about the insipid pop band who sings your least favorite earworm – who wouldn’t want to consign THEM to hell? 

Portal to Hell considers the question, what is a good person? but never too seriously. This is an imaginative, comic triumph for writer/director/cinematographer Woody Bess. Bess has a gift for the deadpan and the absurd.

Trey Holland is excellent as the continually perplexed Dunn, sapped of resilience by a personal loss. So is Romina D’Ugo as the reluctant authority figure at the laundromat. Lauded actor Keith David is perfect as Dunn’s cranky neighbor, ever assessing the younger generation with a critical eye. The great Richard Kind soars as a workaday (but crafty) demon.

This is a very funny movie. I screened Portal to Hell for its world premiere at Slamdance, where I predicted it to be the biggest crowd-pleaser at the fest.

CORONER TO THE STARS: too transparent?

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Photo caption: Dr. Thomas Noguchi in CORONER TO THE STARS. Courtesy of Slamdance.

The absorbing biodoc Coroner to the Stars tells the story of Dr. Thomas Noguchi, the former Los Angeles County Chief Medical Examiner and his bouts with fame (or infamy). His LA County jurisdiction meant that he was responsible for conducting the autopsies of a striking collection of celebrities, including Marilyn Monroe, William Holden, Natalie Wood, John Belushi and the Manson Family’s murder victims. Noguchi was also responsible for making his reports public – and therein lies the rub.

The public is fascinated by the details of celebrity deaths, and the news media eagerly panders to that need, however prurient or ghoulish. Official records in California, including coroner’s reports, are public. Noguchi did not shy away from the media spotlight, which triggered controversy. He was clearly fulfilling his legal duty, but did he enjoy it too much? Was he a publicity hound? Can an official be transparent without being unseemly? Indeed, Coroner to the Star’s tag line is Fame kills.

Writer-director Ben Hethcoat and Keita Ideno, in the first feature for both, present an extraordinarily well-sourced, credible and insightful documentary. Noguchi is still alive at age 98 and appears in the film to speak for himself.

Noguchi’s work (and style) stepped on some influential toes – the families and friends of the deceased, the major Hollywood studios and bureaucratic/political foes. Whenever he came under attack, the subtext was his race and the public perception and acceptance of Asian-Americans. Noguchi was a post-war immigrant who didn’t experience the Japanese-American internment during WW II, but Japanese-Americans traumatized by the camps would organize to defend LA’s highest ranking Japanese-American official.

Noguchi was also an internationally recognized pioneer in forensic science. Coroner to the Stars reveals his determination, in the RFK autopsy, to avoid the mistakes that resulted in the continuing, unresolved contention about the JFK assassination. Coroner to the Stars, without sensationalizing it, also touches on a key finding of the RFK forensic evidence.

Rock-solid in its exploration of race, science and history, Coroner to the Stars thoughtfully considers the challenge of acting professionally with what is sensational. I screened Coroner to the Stars for its world premiere at Slamdance.

Through March 7, 2025, you can stream Coroner to the Stars on the Slamdance Slamdance Channel. A 2025 Slamdance Film Festival Virtual Pass, which brings you Coroner to the Stars and almost all of my Slamdance recommendations, only costs $50.

Dr. Thomas Noguchi (right) in CORONER TO THE STARS. Courtesy of Slamdance.

TWIN FENCES: where is she going? Aaaaah.

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Yana Osman (right) in her TWIN FENCES. Courtesy of Slamdance.

In her quirky, and finally profound, documentary Twin Fences, writer-director Yana Osman starts us off with what seems like a a droll, absurdist film about a ridiculously obscure subject, a prefab concrete fence design replicated thru the USSR. Osman stands, hands down at her side, facing the camera, spouting random facts. It may be off-putting at first, but the approach grows to be intoxicating. When she finds talking heads who are actually experts on the fences, we wonder if we’re watching a parody of a talking head expert documentary. We even hear about a Soviet who returned from Chicago in the 1920s, inspired to improve public health with a proprietary sausage.

Osman’s story takes us through Russia, Afghanistan and Ukraine, until there’s a pivotal tragedy in her family. The ending, with her grandfather, is sweet and heartbreaking.  Only then do we  realize that we’ve just watched a clear-eyed comment on contemporary Russia. 

TWIN FENCES. Courtesy of Slamdance.

I’ve never seen a film that wanders across such disparate topics over 99 minutes, seemingly randomly, but which turns out to get somewhere unexpected and worth arriving at. This is Osman’s first feature; Twin Fences is very well-edited, and unsettling tones on the soundtrack help tell the story. Osman is an idiosyncratic, and, I think, pretty brilliant filmmaker.

Audiences who hang with Twin Fences will be rewarded. I screened Twin Fences for its North American premiere at Slamdance.

Through March 7, 2025, you can stream Twin Fences on the Slamdance Slamdance Channel. A 2025 Slamdance Film Festival Virtual Pass, which brings you Twin Fences and almost all of my Slamdance recommendations, only costs $50.