The Sundance 2023 line up has an array of projects from Black and brown artist we are hoping to see on the big and small screens in 2023.
Sundance Film Festival is coming in a few weeks and they just released their comprehensive slate of independent films selected.
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It will take place January 19–29, 2023, in person in Park City, Salt Lake City, and the Sundance Resort, along with a selection of films available online across the country January 24–29, 2023.
This will be the first time the festival has had in-person attendance since 2020.
This year of the 101 featured projects 45% are from film-makers of colour. And we skimmed through the lengthy Sundance line up to curate a list of projects for you to watch.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: https://festival.sundance.org/
U.S. DRAMATIC COMPETITION
Magazine Dreams
An amateur bodybuilder struggles to find human connection as his relentless drive for recognition pushes him to the brink.
Director: Elijah Bynum
Screenwriter: Elijah Bynum
Producer: Jennifer Fox,Dan Gilroy, Jeffrey Soros, Simon Horsman
Executive Producer: Jonathan Majors, Luke Rodgers, Andrew Blau
Cast: Jonathan Majors, Haley Bennett, Taylour Paige, Mike O’hearn, Harrison Page, Harriet Sansom Harris
A Thousand and One
Convinced it’s one last, necessary crime on the path to redemption, unapologetic and free-spirited Inez kidnaps 6-year-old Terry from the foster care system. Holding on to their secret and each other, mother and son set out to reclaim their sense of home, identity, and stability in New York City.
Director: A.V. Rockwell
Screenwriter: A.V. Rockwell
Producer: Eddie Vaisman, Julia Lebedev, Lena Waithe, Rishi Rajani, Brad Weston
Cast: Teyana Taylor, Will Catlett, Josiah Cross, Aven Courtney, Aaron Kingsley Adetola
All Dirt Roads Taste Of Salt
A decades-spanning exploration of a woman’s life in Mississippi and an ode to the generations of people, places, and ineffable moments that shape us.
Director: Raven Jackson
Screenwriter: Raven Jackson
Producer: Maria Altamirano, Barry Jenkins, Adele Romanski, Mark Ceryak
Cast: Charleen McClure, Moses Ingram, Kaylee Nicole Johnson, Reginald Helms Jr., Sheila Atim, Chris Chalk, Jayah Henry, Zainab Jah
Fancy Dance
Following her sister’s disappearance, a Native American hustler kidnaps her niece from the child’s white grandparents and sets out for the state powwow in hopes of keeping what is left of their family intact.
Director: Erica Tremblay
Screenwriter: Erica Tremblay and Miciana Alise
Producer: Erica Tremblay, Deidre Backs, Heather Rae, Nina Yang Bongiovi, Tommy Oliver
Executive Producer: Bird Runningwater
Cast: Lily Gladstone, Isabel Deroy-olson, Ryan Begay, Shea Whigham, Audrey Wasilewski
WORLD CINEMA DRAMATIC COMPETITION
Girl
Eleven-year-old Ama and her mother, Grace, take solace in the gentle but isolated world they obsessively create. Ama’s growing up threatens the boundaries of their tenderness and forces Grace to reckon with a past she struggles to forget.
Director: Adura Onashile
Screenwriter: Adura Onashile
Producer: Rosie Crerar, Ciara Barry
Cast: Déborah Lukumuena, Danny Sapani, Le’shantey Bonsu, Liana Turner
Mami Wata
When the harmony in a village is threatened by outside elements, two sisters must fight to save their people and restore the glory of a mermaid goddess to the land.
Director: C.J. “Fiery” Obasi
Screenwriter: C.J. “Fiery” Obasi
Producer: Oge Obasi
Cast: Evelyne Ily, Uzoamaka Aniunoh, Kelechi Udegbe, Emeka Amakeze, Rita Edochie, Tough Bone
Heroic
Luis, an 18-year-old boy with Indigenous roots, enters the Heroic Military College in hopes of ensuring a better future. There, he encounters a rigid and institutionally violent system designed to turn him into a perfect soldier.
Director: David Zonana
Screenwriter: David Zonana
Producer: David Zonana, Michel Franco, Erendira Nunez Larios
Cast: Santiago Sandoval Carbajal, Fernando Cuautle, Mónica Del Carmen, Esteban Caicedo, Carlos Gerardo García, Isabel Yudice
Sorcery
On the remote island of Chiloé in the late 19th century, an Indigenous girl named Rosa lives and works with her father on a farm. When the foreman brutally turns on Rosa’s father, she sets out for justice, seeking help from the king of a powerful organization of sorcerers.
Director: Christopher Murray
Screenwriter: Christopher Murray
Producer: Juan De Dios Larraín, Pablo Larraín, Rocío Jadue, Nicolás Celis
Co-Producer: Viola Fügen, Michael Weber
Executive Producer: Sergio Karmy
Cast: Valentina Véliz, Daniel Antivilo, Sebastian Hulk, Daniel Muñoz
NEXT CATEGORY
Young. Wild. Free.
High school senior Brandon is drowning in responsibilities when his world is turned upside down after being robbed at gunpoint by the girl of his dreams.
Director: Thembi L. Banks
Screenwriter: Juel Taylor and Tony Rettenmaier
Producer: Charles D. King, James Lopez, Poppy Hanks, Tommy Oliver, Baron Davis, Tracy “Twinkie” Byrd
Cast: Algee Smith, Sanaa Lathan, Sierra Capri, Mike Epps
KOKOMO CITY
Four Black transgender sex workers explore the dichotomy between the Black community and themselves while confronting issues long avoided.
Director: D. Smith
Executive Producer: Stacy Barthe, William Melillo
Producer: D. Smith, Harris Doran, Bill Butler
Cast: Daniella Carter, Koko Da Doll, Liyah Mitchell, Dominique Silver
Bravo, Burkina!
A Burkinabé boy flees his village and migrates to Italy. When disillusioned by heartbreak and haunted by memories of home, he travels through time in hope of regaining all he has lost.
Director: Wale Oyejide
Screenwriter: Wale Oyejide
Executive Producer: Wale Oyejide, Simone Cipriani, Chloe Mukai
Produced By: Wale Oyejide, Giulia Alagna, Heather Barnes
Cast: Alain Tiendrebeogo, Mousty Mbaye, Noel Minougou, Aissata Deme, Afissatou Coulibaly
To Live And Die And Live
Muhammad returns home to Detroit to bury his stepfather and is thrust into settling his accounts, but Muhammad’s struggles with depression and addiction may finish him before he finishes the task.
Director: Qasim Basir
Screenwriter: Qasim Basir
Producer: Samantha Basir and Dana Offenbach
Produced By: Nina Yang Bongiovi, Forest Whitaker, Qasim Basir, Amin Joseph, Cory Hardrict, Omari Hardwick
Cast: Amin Joseph, Skye P Marshall, Omari Hardwick, Cory Hardrict, Dana Gourrier, Maryam Basir
U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Little Richard: I Am Everything
This celebration of Little Richard reveals the Black queer origins of rock ’n’ roll, finally exploding the whitewashed canon of American pop music. Through archival and performance footage, the revolutionary icon’s life unspools with all of its switchbacks and contradictions.
Director: Lisa Cortés
Executive Producer: Mike Powers, Amy Entelis, Courtney Sexton, Gus Wenner, Jason Fine, Dee Rees
Producer: Lisa Cortés, Robert Friedman, Liz Yale Marsh, Caryn Capotosto
Going To Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project
Intimate vérité, archival footage, and visually innovative treatments of poetry take us on a journey through the dreamscape of legendary poet Nikki Giovanni as she reflects on her life and legacy.
Director: Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson
Producer: Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson
Bad Press
When the Muscogee Nation suddenly begins censoring its free press, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government’s corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian country.
Director: Rebecca Landsberry-Baker and Joe Peeler
Producer: Conrad Beilharz, Garrett F. Baker, Tyler Graim
Going Varsity In Mariachi
In the competitive world of high school mariachi, the musicians from the South Texas borderlands reign supreme. Under the guidance of coach Abel Acuña, the teenage captains of Edinburg North High School’s acclaimed team must turn a shoestring budget and diverse crew of inexperienced musicians into state champions.
Director: Alejandra Vasquez and Sam Osborn
Executive Producer: Jenny Raskin, Lauren Haber, Geralyn White Dreyfous, Owen Panettieri, Steve Cohen, Paula Froehle, Debbie L. Mcleod
Co-Executive Producer: Meryl Metni, Kelsey Koenig, Jennifer Pelling, Producer
Producer: James Lawler, Luis A. Miranda, Jr., Julia Pontecorvo
The Stroll
The history of New York’s Meatpacking District, told from the perspective of transgender sex workers who lived and worked there. Filmmaker Kristen Lovell, who walked “The Stroll” for a decade, reunites her community to recount the violence, policing, homelessness, and gentrification they overcame to build a movement for transgender rights.
Director: Kristen Lovell and Zackary Drucker
Producer: Matt Wolf
WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Milisuthando
Set in past, present, and future South Africa — an invitation into a poetic, memory-driven exploration of love, intimacy, race, and belonging by the filmmaker, who grew up during apartheid but didn’t know it was happening until it was over.
Director: Milisuthando Bongela
Screenwriter: Milisuthando Bongela
Executive Producer: Jessica Devaney and Anya Rous
Producer: Marion Isaacs
Co-Producer: Viviana Gómez Echeverry and Sonia Barrera Gutiérrez
Twice Colonized
Renowned Inuit lawyer Aaju Peter has long fought for the rights of her people. When her son suddenly dies, Aaju embarks on a journey to reclaim her language and culture after a lifetime of whitewashing and forced assimilation. But can she both change the world and mend her own wounds?
Director: Lin Alluna
Screenwriter: Aaju Petr
Producer: Emile Hertling Péronard, Alethea Arnaquq-baril, Stacey Aglok Macdonald, Bob Moore
PREMIERES
Rye Lane
Two twenty-somethings reeling from bad breakups deal with their nightmare exes and connect over the course of an eventful day in South London.
Director: Raine Allen-Miller
Screenwriter: Nathan Bryon and Tom Melia
Producer: Yvonne Isimeme Ibazebo and Damian Jones
Cast: David Jonsson and Vivian Oparah
The Pod Generation
In a not-so-distant future, amid a society madly in love with technology, tech giant Pegazus offers couples the opportunity to share their pregnancies via detachable artificial wombs or pods. And so begins Rachel and Alvy’s wild ride to parenthood in this brave new world.
Director: Sophie Barthes
Screenwriter: Sophie Barthes
Producer: Geneviève Lemal, Yann Zenou, Nadia Kamlichi, Martin Metz
Cast: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Emilia Clarke, Rosalie Craig, Vinette Robinson, Jean-marc Barr
Landscape with Invisible Hand
When Earth is taken over by aliens who control the economy, a pair of teenagers come up with a plan to save their families.
Director: Cory Finley
Screenwriter: Cory Finley
Producer: Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner
Cast: Tiffany Haddish, Asante Blackk, Kylie Rogers, Josh Hamilton, Michael Gandolfini, William Jackson Harper
Invisible Beauty
Fashion revolutionary Bethann Hardison looks back on her journey as a pioneering Black model, modeling agent, and activist, shining a light on an untold chapter in the fight for racial diversity.
Director: Bethann Hardison and Frédéric Tcheng
Producer: Lisa Cortés
Drift
Jacqueline, a young refugee, lands alone and penniless on a Greek island where she tries to survive, then to cope with her past. While gathering her strength, she begins a friendship with a rootless tour guide and together they find the resilience to forge ahead.
Director: Anthony Chen
Screenwriter: Susie Farrell and Alexander Maksik
Producer: Peter Spears, Emilie Georges, Naima Abed, Anthony Chen, Cynthia Erivo, Solome Williams
Cast: Cynthia Erivo, Alia Shawkat, Ibrahima Ba, Honor Swinton Byrne, Zainab Jah, Suzy Bemba
FROM THE COLLECTION
SLAM
A young, Black performance poet is imprisoned for a petty pot crime in a D.C. prison, but it’s where he finds salvation in his rhymes. A celebration of the spoken word through sublime poetry, heart-wrenching realism, and the redemptive power of art.
Director: Marc Levin
Screenwriter: Marc Levin, Sonja Sohn, Richard Stratton, Saul Williams
Producer: Henri M. Kessler, Marc Levin, Richard Stratton
Cast: