Sundance 2021 is a Wrap

by Nathaniel R

CODA was the big winner at Sundance and sold for an extravagant amount of money.

Thank you to Jason, Abe, Murtada, and Eurocheese for their coverage of the traditionally snowy but now virtual and room temperature Sundance Film Festival which wrapped on Wednesday. In case you missed any of the reviews here they all are in one place. As with ALL Sundance film festivals, some of these picture will fade quickly from awareness, others will be talked about incessantly upon release, and still others might strangely go into hiding for a year and all but forgotten before being rediscovered when they get a streaming deal or some such in the not so near future. But which ones? It all depends on the vagaries of distribution, media and public reaction, and future awards play. For example at the 2020 Sundance Awards Minari and I Carry You With Me (both on my top ten list for 2020) were both multiple winners but only Minari seems to have any heat going into the Oscar nominations while I Carry You With Me just kind of sat out awards season despite a qualifying week in virtual cinemas and now won't be released until May 21st, 2021 (sigh) one and a half years after its high profile success at Sundance. 

Our complete list of reviews plus all the Sundance 2021 winners are after the jump...

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The Furniture: A Centennial Tribute to Ken Adam and The Ipcress File

"The Furniture," by Daniel Walber. (Click on images for magnified detail)

Ken Adam in 1976. Photo © Deutchse Kinemathek

Today marks the centennial of legendary production designer Ken Adam, the artist responsible for some of the biggest film sets of the 20th century. The first that comes to mind for me is the supertanker in The Spy Who Loved Me, built on the world’s largest sound stage. Adam designed dozens of secret military facilities and hidden lairs for the seven James Bond films he worked on. But his most famous is probably the “War Room” from Dr. Strangelove, another vast interior  - and the reason he had to turn down From Russia with Love.

Adam’s legacy is intimately connected to these atomic fantasies, which continue to influence our collective memory of the Cold War...

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Showbiz History: Love Story wins, Captain America begins, United Artists formed

8 random things that happened on this day, February 5th, in showbiz history

1919 United Artists is formed with four of the most iconic silent film powerhouses Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and Director DW Griffith joining forces...

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Interview: Malgorzata Szumowska talks Oscar, Great Actors, and "Never Gonna Snow Again"

by Nathaniel R

Though it's easy to lose track of great cinema, especially in this strange time of virtual festivals and very little traditional moviegoing, you won't want to miss Never Gonna Snow Again, when it arrives this Spring. The Polish hopeful in this year's Oscar's International Feature Film race is a hard-to-describe elusive wonder about a Ukranian massage therapist (Stranger Thing's Alec Utgoff) who a suburban community becomes obsessed with. We were thrilled to jump on the phone with its talented 47 year-old director Malgorzata Szumowska. She's forged a long and international career for herself with award winning films like Elles (with Juliette Binoche), Body, the LGBT drama In the Name of, and her first English language picture last year, the cult drama The Other Lamb. 

She goes by 'Malgo'. "It's easier," she offers quickly, surely having heard her name mangled before. The director lives up to our expectations with a candid tongue and sharp sense of humor. Poland is a large country but she describes their film industry as small though not without its professional jealousy for those with international careers. The name directors, she adds, are "very supportive" of one another, name-checking three of the country's finest as we settle in for our chat: She mentions Jan Komasa (Corpus Christi) briefly; Pawel Pawlikowski (Cold War, Ida) is her very close friend -- she actually found him his lead novice actress for his Oscar-winning Ida; and shortly before our chat, Oscar nominee Agnieska Holland (Europa Europa, In Darkness) had called to catch up.

We're crossing our fingers that she soon joins their ranks at the Oscars. But Malgo appears to be less of a dreamer and more of a bemused pragmatist when it comes to careers and awards. "Some people think they'll make one film and then they'll be in Hollywood. It doesn't work that way. If you make a movie that wins an Oscar than, yes, but that's an accident, a lottery."  She's in it for the long haul and the work and eager to get on with her next project as we spoke...

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Congratulations to the SAG Cast Nominees... but please raise a glass to those who were left out!

by Nathaniel R

Taylour Paige and Dusan Brown aren't included in "Ma Rainey's" nomination

Each year when the SAG nominations for Outstanding Cast is named, we bemoan the rules which cause unneccessary exclusions. To be an official nominee you need to have your own title card. Having your own title card generally requires that you either already have a degree of fame, a strong agent if you don't, or a large role... so sometimes it excludes really crucial contributions to a movie. Everyone who doesn't get their own title card gets a certificate but they aren't officially "nominees" based on SAG's rules. This year, only Trial of the Chicago 7 (which has a giant cast) and Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (which has a very intimate cast) have really unfortunate exclusions...

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