Sundance film festival premieres include a shapeshifting Cate Blanchett, Jack Black putting on a show, Scottish horror Bitch and documentaries on gender transitioning, surfing and terror
The Sundance film festival has completed the lineup for its 2017 edition, adding to the previously announced titles with the now customary mix of big Hollywood names, acclaimed indie directors and celebrated European auteurs.
Most of the new films are in the festivals Premieres strand, and will see, among others, Cate Blanchett, Jack Black and A Bigger Splash director Luca Guadagnino pitching up in Park City, Utah. Blanchett plays multiple roles as the central figure in Manifesto, a re-enactment of artists statements from German director Julian Rosefeldt; Black stars in The Polka King, a comedy about Jan Lewan, a real-life Polish-American polka showman who was jailed after his Ponzi scheme collapsed; and Guadagnino arrives with his new film Call Me By Your Name, about an Italian boy who falls in love with a visiting academic (played by The Lone Rangers Armie Hammer).
The festival also sees the return of a string of Sundances favourite sons and daughters: Youth in Revolt director Miguel Arteta brings Beatriz at Dinner, a comedy starring Salma Hayek as a holistic health practitioner; Michelle Pfeiffer stars in Where Is Kyra?, a drama about a woman who loses her job; and the festivals founder Robert Redford pops up alongside Jason Segel and Rooney Mara in The Discovery, a romance set in a future world where the afterlife is a proven fact. Sundance will also see the directorial debut of Hell or High Water scriptwriter Taylor Sheridan: Wind River, a crime thriller set on a Native American reservation starring Jeremy Renner and Elisabeth Olsen.
Sundance has also attracted some heavyweight names to its documentary section. The Crash Reels Lucy Walker is bringing her follow-up to Wim Wenders celebrated Buena Vista Social Club, while Barbara Kopples This Is Everything: Gigi Gorgeous follows the gender transitioning of an Olympic-level diver.
Elsewhere in the lineup Sundance has found room for Bitch, a horror-thriller from Scottish actor-director Marianna Palka about a woman who thinks shes a dog; the first three episodes of Amazons I Love Dick, based on the celebrated novel by Chris Kraus; and Oklahoma City a documentary by Barak Goodman about the terrorist bombing in 1995 of the Alfred P Murrah Federal Building.
The Sundance film festival runs from 19-29 January.
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figcaption class=”caption” caption–img caption caption–img” itemprop=”description”> Jack Black and Jason Schwartzman star in The Polka King. Photograph: Andrei Bowden Schwartz / Sundance Institute
Premieres
Beatriz at Dinner (Dir: Miguel Arteta)
A Mexican immigrant health worker (Salma Hayek) has a mutually life-changing encounter with a smug billionaire (John Lithgow) at a dinner event.
Before I Fall (Dir: Ry Russo-Young)
A fable about a young woman (Zoey Deutch) who is forced to question her perfect life.
The Big Sick (Dir: Michael Showalter)
A cross cultural relationship is threatened when a woman becomes ill, and her Pakistani-born boyfriend struggles to deal with it.
Call Me By Your Name (Dir: Luca Guadagnino)
Gay romance from the Bigger Splash director, about a boy who falls in love with a visiting academic.
The Discovery (Dir: Charlie McDowell)
Romance with Jason Segel and Rooney Mara in a world where the afterlife is a scientifically proven fact.
Fun Mom Dinner (Dir: Alethea Jones)
Four mothers of kids at the same school set up a dinner, but it doesnt go quite the way they expect.
The Incredible Jessica James (Dir: Jim Strouse)
Romantic drama about a playwright (The Daily Shows Jessica Williams) who begins a relationship after a tough breakup with recently divorced man (Chris ODowd).
The Last Word (Dir: Mark Pellington)
A former businesswoman (Shirley MacLaine) becomes friends with a young journalist (Amanda Seyfried) after she decides to write her own obituary.
Manifesto (Dir: Julian Rosefeldt)
Video artist Rosefeldt stages re-enactments of key artists manifestos, as performed by Cate Blanchett.
Marjorie Prime (Dir: Michael Almereyda)
Sci-fi parable about an elderly woman who is given an AI companion that is a replica of her late husband.
Mudbound (Dir: Dee Rees)
Mississippi-set drama with Carey Mulligan and Garret Hedlund, about a family attempting to adjust to life after the end of the second world war.
The Polka King (Dir: Maya Forbes)
Jack Black comedy about real-life polka fraudster Jan Lewan.
Rebel in the Rye (Dir: Danny Strong)
Nicholas Hoult plays JD Salinger in a study of the early years of the celebrated Catcher in the Rye author.
Rememory (Dir: Mark Palansky)
Noirish thriller about the death of a scientist who has invented a device to record and play out human memories.
Sidney Hall (Dir: Shawn Christensen)
Logan Lerman plays a novelist who hits big early with a generation-defining book but whose life then falls apart.
Where is Kyra? (Dir: Andrew Dosunmu)
A sensitive woman (Michelle Pfeiffer) struggles to hold things together after her mother dies.
Wilson (Dir: Craig Johnson)
Woody Harrelson stars in an adaptation of Daniel Clowes graphic novel about a lonely misanthrope who reconnects with his former wife and teenage daughter.
Wind River (Dir: Taylor Sheridan)
Sicario writer makes his directorial debut with a thriller about an FBI agent (Jeremy Renner) trying to solve a killing on a Native American reservation.
Documentary premieres
500 Years (Dir: Pamela Yates)
The recent history of Guatemala as seen through the eyes of the local indigenous people.
Cries from Syria (Dir: Evgeny Afineevsky)
Account of the current humanitarian crisis and its effect on anti-migrant hostility.
Give Me Future: Major Lazer in Cuba (Dir: Austin Peters)
Record of the dance music acts 2016 free concert in Havana, heralding a society on the brink of major change.
Legion of Brothers (Dir: Greg Barker)
Account of a US special-forces mission inside Afghanistan straight after 9/11.
Oklahoma City (Dir: Barak Goodman)
Study of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, the worst ever incident of domestic terrorism on US soil.
Rancher, Farmer, Fisherman (Dirs: Susan Froemke, John Hoffman, Beth Aala)
Study of how climate change is affecting farming folk and what they are doing to protect the environment.
Take Every Wave: The Life of Laird Hamilton (Dir: Rory Kennedy)
Bio-doc of surf pioneer Hamilton.
Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges and Universities (Dir: Stanley Nelson)
Account of the crucial role played by higher-education institutions that have developed African-American intellectual life.
This Is Everything: Gigi Gorgeous (Dir: Barbara Kopple)
Oscar-winner Kopples study of a family in turmoil after a champion diver embarks on gender transition.
Untitled Lucy Walker/Buena Vista Social Club Documentary (Dir: Lucy Walker)
The British directors follow-up to the celebrated 1999 documentary about Cuban musicians.
Midnight
78/52 (Dir: Alexandre Philippe)
Detailed inside look at the legendary shower scene in Alfred Hitchcocks Psycho, largely credited with kickstarting modern horror cinema.
Bad Day for the Cut (Dir: Chris Baugh)
Revenge thriller about a farmer who heads off to Belfast looking for answers after his mother is murdered.
Bitch (Dir: Marianna Palka)
New film from the Good Dick director, about a woman (played by Palka herself) in breakdown who starts acting like a dog.
Bushwick (Dirs: Cary Murnion, Jonathan Milott)
Action thriller in which Brooklyn has been invaded by secessonist militias.
Killing Ground (Dir: Damien Power)
A couple find a seemingly abandoned child at a campsite and end up undergoing an ordeal to survive.
Kuso (Dir: Steven Ellison)
Post-apocalyptic fable set in the aftermath of a huge LA earthquake, directed by the musician AKA Flying Lotus.
The Little Hours (Dir: Jeff Baena)
Dark comedy starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco, about a medieval Italian convent where a young servant finds refuge.
XX (Dirs: Annie Clark, Karyn Kusama, Roxanne Benjamin, Jovanka Vuckovic)
Four-part horror anthology bringing together films from female directors.
Spotlight
Colossal (Dir: Nacho Vigalondo)
Anne Hathaway stars in an oddball tale of an American girl who develops a psychic connection with a giant Korean monster.
Frantz (Dir: Franois Ozon)
Sumptuous and moving drama, about a German woman mourning her fiances death in the first world war, and the Frenchman who claims to have known him well.
Lady Macbeth (Dir: William Oldroyd)
Low-budget British romance set in the 19th century, with a Lady Chatterleys Lover style narrative.
Look and See: A Portrait of Wendell Berry (Dirs: Laura Dunn, Jef Sewell)
Study of the American essayist and activist and his assessment of rural America and its agricultural practices in the modern era.
Raw (Dir: Julia Ducournau)
Notorious cannibal horror about a vegetarian student who develops a craving for meat after a hazing ritual.
Sami Blood (Dir: Amanda Kernell)
1930s set drama about a young Sami girl the indigenous Lapland people and the struggles she endures in the face of anti-Sami prejudice.
Their Finest (Dir: Lone Scherfig)
Romantic comedy set during the second world war, with Gemma Arterton as a writer joining the British attempt to get the US to join the war effort.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/dec/06/sundance-film-festival-2017-full-lineup