For all aspiring and established indie moviemakers, getting a project shown on-screen at Sundance Film Festival is the ultimate goal. Every year in Park City, Utah, Sundance always shines the spotlight on films with novel and pioneering plot lines that invoke progressive discourse among attendees. This year was no different, as Sundance 2020 was filled with highly original films and revolutionary documentaries.
One monumental cinematic masterpiece was Welcome to Chechnya, a documentary about a group of activists risking unimaginable peril to confront the ongoing anti-LGBTQ pogrom raging in the repressive, closed Russian republic. This intense movie gave an inside look at the immense struggle and persecution that LGBTQ+ people in Chechnya face and what the activists have to go through to help them escape. It was exceptionally filmed and edited, so much so that it earned Sundance‘s U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for Editing.
High-profile political figures also played major roles in Sundance 2020 films. Barack Obama and Michelle Obama were the executive producers of Crip Camp, an enthralling documentary about the revolution that blossomed in a ramshackle, unorthodox summer camp for teenagers with disabilities in the early 1970s. Arriving the same year as the 30th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Crip Camp shows how the summer camp transforms the young people’s lives and ignites a landmark movement. This remarkable film also won Sundance 2020’s Audience Award: U.S. Documentary, presented by Acura.
Hillary, starring Hillary Clinton and directed by Nanette Burstein, was another must-see film that many Sundance attendees wanted a ticket to. Featuring exclusive interviews with Hillary herself, Bill Clinton, friends, and journalists, this fascinating film examines how she became simultaneously one of the most admired and vilified women in the world. The movie also interweaves moments from never-before-seen 2016 campaign footage with biographical chapters of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s life.
The Cinema Café at Sundance Film Festival also put on an informal chat with Hillary Clinton and Nanette Burstein! Presented in collaboration with Variety magazine, this conversation gave attendees the chance to get an exclusive inside look at Hillary’s Sundance experience, what it was like to film the movie, and more. This was an enormously popular event, with festivalgoers lining up over an hour in advance to attend.
A-list entertainment stars also played pivotal roles in popular films at Sundance 2020. Andy Samberg and Camila Mendes starred in Palm Springs, a thrilling film about a reluctant maid of honor who meets a carefree gentleman at a Palm Springs wedding and things get complicated the next morning. Radha Blank and Lena Waithe also starred in The 40-Year-Old Version, winner of the Sundance Film Festival Directing Award. Also directed by Blank, this engrossing movie is about a down-on-her-luck New York playwright who reinvents herself and salvages her artistic voice by becoming a rapper at age 40.
Another top film was Black Bear, starring Aubrey Plaza, Sarah Gadon, and Christopher Abbott. In this enthralling movie, a filmmaker plays a calculated game of desire and jealousy at a remote lake house in the pursuit of a script that blurs the boundaries between autobiography and invention. The film’s outstanding acting and storyline left the audience in awe. Sundance attendees also flocked to screenings for Downhill, starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Will Ferrell. In this hilarious movie, a married couple is forced to reevaluate their lives after they barely escape an avalanche during a family ski vacation in the Alps.
If you are currently working on a new independent film project and want to get it mass exposure, make it a priority to submit it to Sundance Film Festival 2021. The Sundance Institute also offers many wonderful labs, grants, and fellowships that help independent storytellers develop their craft and bring their movie project to completion. Apply and submit your project for these superb opportunities at sundance.org.
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