Sundance has officially unveiled the list of films it will be highlighting as a part of its 2024 festival, and from the looks of it, it’s going to be an exciting year. Of over 17,000 submissions (the highest number ever), Sundance has chosen 91 projects to screen in person in Park City and Salt Lake City from January 18–28, 2024, as well as a select number of titles that will concurrently stream online. These films showcase a wide range of talent both new and familiar, from recognizable faces and directors to up-and-coming stars. Here are some projects to keep an eye on, organized by competition category:
The ten films represented in this category all contend with issues of identity, family, and the pressures of history, religion, love, and loss. Among them is the Jason Schwartzman-led Between The Temples, which tells the story of a cantor experiencing a crisis of faith, the John Early led-Stress Positions, Ponyboi, starring and written by River Gallo, the Jesse Eisenberg-led and directed A Real Pain about two cousins who reunite for a tour through Poland (also starring Kieran Culkin), and Suncoast, starring Laura Linney and Woody Harrelson. Other films include Dìdi (弟弟), Exhibiting Forgiveness, Good One, and In The Summers from first time directors Sean Wang, Titus Kaphar, India Donaldson, and Alessandra Lacorazza respectively. Perhaps the biggest swing in this category is Love Me, which stars Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun as a buoy and a satellite falling in love online after the fall of humanity.
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This year’s U.S. documentary competition features a vast range of topics, from wounded hummingbirds in Every Little Thing to stories with global implications like that of three Ukranian artists in Porcelain War and Amazon at large in Union. Other subjects include Frida Kahlo, daughters of incarcerated fathers, Argentine Gauchos, A.I., missing children at an Indian residential school, and more.
This international dramatic category also contains ten promising films about a variety of subjects, from the legacy of China’s one-child policy in Jianjie Lin’s Brief History Of A Family,Layla. Other films in this category include Girls Will Be Girls, Handling The Undead, In The Land Of Brothers, and Malu, all from first time directors.
Climate change, nature, and isolation are key themes in this year’s international documentary competition, with Kenya’s The Battle For Laikipia highlighting the first, India’s Nocturnes exploring the second, and Bhutan and Hungary’s Agent Of Happiness, and Norway’s Ibelin and A New Kind Of Wilderness all contending with the third. Other titles include Black Box Diaries from Japan, Eternal You from Germany, and Soundtrack To A Coup D’Etat from Belgium, France, and the Netherlands.
Featuring a mix of documentary and fiction, Sundance’s Next category highlights films “distinguished by an innovative, forward-thinking approach to storytelling.” These fictional stories include the Michael Fassbender-starring Kneecap, about an Irish-speaking rap group in Belfast, the Darren Aronofsky produced and David Schwimmer-led Little Death, and Tendaberry, from directors/writer/producer Haley Elizabeth Anderson. Desire Lines, Realm Of Satan, and Seeking Mavis Beacon make up this category’s documentary offerings.
With 20 included films, Premieres is the largest and perhaps most anticipated category of the festival. Salt Lakes’s opening film Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story falls in this category, as well as documentaries about Devo, American policing, Sue Bird, Will Ferrell embarking on a road trip with his newly out trans friend, and more. Fiction offerings in this category also encompass a wide array of stories, from the Sebastian Stan-led A Different Man, which follows an actor after he surgically transforms his face, to the Pedro Pascal-starring Freaky Tales, which tells four interconnected stories from 1980s Oakland. Other notable actors in this category include Aubrey Plaza and Maddie Ziegler (My Old Ass), Saoirse Ronan (The Outrun), Lucy Liu and Julia Fox (Presence), Mary J. Blige and Camila Cabello (Rob Peace), Riley Keough and Jesse Eisenberg (Sasquatch Sunset), and Connie Britton and Zach Galifianakis (Winner).
Generally housing Sundance’s horror offerings, this category includes eight films that will “keep you wide awake and on the edge of your seat.” Two of the most anticipated films in this category are Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw The TV Glow, which was produced by Emma Stone and her husband Dave McCary and tells the story of a teenage boy who sees another world through his television screen, and Rose Glass’ Love Lies Bleeding, which stars Kristen Stewart, Ed Harris, and Dave Franco in a tale of crime, violence, and bodybuilding. After being fired from the Scream franchise, Melissa Barrera also gets another chance to star in a thriller with Your Monster.
The Episodic category features documentaries told over multiple installments. This year’s range of topics includes Tammy Faye, a gym founded by a former inmate, the state of Texas, Lollapalooza, and the Synanon organization.
This year, Sundance will highlight four films that have played over the past year, including Richard Linklater’s Hit Man, Molly Manning Walker’s How To Have Sex, Marie Amachoukeli’s Àma Gloria, and documentary The Mother Of All Lies.
While the previous categories cover some pretty heavy topics, younger viewers can get excited about Sundance this year too. Two child-friendly films will be screening at this year’s festival: Out Of My Mind, starring Rosemarie DeWitt, Luke Kirby, and Judith Light, and 10 Lives, starring Mo Gilligan, Simone Ashley, Sophie Okonedo, Dylan Llewellyn, Zayn Malick, and Bill Nighy.
This year, the festival is putting on a special screening of the documentary War Game, which follows a group of U.S. policymakers as they participate in a role-playing exercise in which they have to confront a political coup. There will also be two New Frontier performances—defined as those at the “crossroads of film, art, performance, and new media technology”—by Brian Eno and Being (the Digital Griot).