Sundance 2012 competition lineup: Sex, Alison Brie and Lizzy Caplan, sex, sex, John Hawkes, sex
It’s almost time for the maintenance crews of Park City, Utah to begin wresting their boarded-up town out of the snow and readying it anew for a week of liquor company-sponsored parties and also movies sometimes: The Sundance Film Festival has announced its 2012 competition slate, providing an early glimpse at what movies you’ll be hearing about all next year. It’s like a window into the future!
Last year’s lineup certainly yielded a bumper crop—The Ledge and Terri, of course, but also stuff like Martha Marcy May Marlene, Like Crazy, and Being Elmo. Spotting early contenders for accolades is never an easy task—and some might still argue that the everything at last year’s Sundance was eclipsed by Kevin Smith’s ego anyway—but while we can’t predict what will break out, we can point you to certain films that seem tailored specifically to the particular interests of The A.V. Club readership.
For instance, Save The Date, previously known as “that movie what has Alison Brie and Lizzy Caplan in it” that briefly crashed our servers when it was first rumored. And along those same stars-we-like lines, James Ponsoldt’s Smashed has a cast that includes Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Aaron Paul, Octavia Spencer, and Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally, Rick Alverson’s sardonic drama The Comedy stars a very toned-down Tim And Eric in the lead roles, and Aubrey Plaza, Mark Duplass, and New Girl’s Jake Johnson star in a comedy about reporters investigating time travelers called Safety Not Guaranteed. These are things you are expected to see and have an opinion on later, so get to know them now.
Also, while the slate seems sort of heavy on stories about families being torn apart, there are also plenty of movies about sex, including one with William H. Macy and John Hawkes about a “sex surrogate.” And if there’s one thing Sundance audiences have been proven to like, it’s sex and John Hawkes. The full dramatic competition slate is below; you can see the foreign and documentary entries here, which includes a lot of movies about poor people and one about YouTube blogger Chris Crocker that people will probably preemptively make fun of but then rush to see. And of course, as always, our own Noel Murray and Nathan Rabin will be among those people come festival time (though not necessarily at that Chris Crocker movie).
Beasts of the Southern Wild/ U.S.A. (Director: Benh Zeitlin, Screenwriters: Benh Zeitlin, Lucy Alibar) — Waters gonna rise up, wild animals gonna rerun from the grave, and everything south of the levee is goin’ under, in this tale of a six year old named Hushpuppy, who lives with her daddy at the edge of the world. Cast: Quvenzhané Wallis, Dwight Henry.
The Comedy/ U.S.A. (Director: Rick Alverson, Screenwriters: Rick Alverson, Robert Donne, Colm O'Leary) — Indifferent even to the prospects of inheriting his father's estate, Swanson whiles away his days with a group of aging Brooklyn hipsters, engaging in small acts of recreational cruelty and pacified boredom. Cast: Tim Heidecker, Eric Wareheim, Kate Lyn Sheil, Alexia Rassmusen, Gregg Turkington.
The End of Love/ U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Mark Webber) — A young father unravels following the loss of the mother of his child. Cast: Mark Webber, Shannyn Sossamon, Michael Cera, Jason Ritter, Amanda Seyfried, Frankie Shaw.
Filly Brown/ U.S.A. (Directors: Youssef Delara, Michael D. Olmos, Screenwriter: Youssef Delara) — A Hip Hop-driven drama about a Mexican girl who rises to fame and consciousness as she copes with the incarceration of her mother through music. Cast: Lou Diamond Phillips, Gina Rodriguez, Jenni Rivera, Edward James Olmos.
The First Time/ U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Jonathan Kasdan) — Two high schoolers meet at a party. Over the course of a weekend, things turn magical, romantic, complicated and funny, as they discover what it's like to fall in love for the first time. Cast: Brittany Robertson, Dylan O'Brien, Craig Roberts, James Frecheville, Victoria Justice.