14 Jun 24
Sundance Film Festival: London is always a special weekend on the Picturehouse calendar, and this year's festival was no exception.
With a programme of shorts, a repertory strand showcasing Sundance favourites, and brilliant new feature, our 11th edition as the London host of the beloved independent film festival truly had something for everyone.
While we can wholeheartedly recommend the whole lineup - which you can find on our Letterboxd - here are five favourites that you can catch at a Picturehouse near you in the coming weeks.
Laura Franco is broken-hearted: recovering from surgery, recently and unceremoniously dumped, and moved back into her mother's empty house with only pie to keep her company. But she's not alone: the childhood monster in her closet is still here, and he wants to talk about life.
So begins Your Monster, Caroline Lindy's genre-juggling, crowd-pleasing, monster musical romantic comedy - a debut bursting with energy, warm-heartedness and a twisted streak of female fury.
Rising scream queen Melissa Barrera, most recently seen in vampire horror Abigail, is no stranger to the dark and bloody. Here, she has the chance to flex the musical theatre talents we saw on display in 2021's In the Heights.
It's a monster good time, with plenty to say - don't miss this weekend's encore.
Encore screening at Picturehouse Central this Sunday 16 Jun | Book now
And now for something completely different…! Sundance veterans the Zellner brothers, the duo behind 2014's Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter, are back with Sasquatch Sunset.
Balancing absurdist humour, environmental musing and powerful, unexpected pathos, Sasquatch Sunset imagines a year in the life of a Bigfoot family. It's an American epic – just with hairier heroes than you're used to.
Stars Jesse Eisenberg and Riley Keogh commit completely to the mythical beasts they portray - the cast went through 'ape camp' together to develop a shared physicality and language of grunts and yips - and the result is something deeply felt, despite its silliness.
If you're looking for something fresh, unique and profoundly weird, this is the cinematic odyssey for you.
From 14 Jun | Book now
For those who didn't catch the videos as the cat was let out of the bag: yes, Kinds of Kindness was our Surprise Film this year!
You might think after the titanic collaboration that was Poor Things - only released this past January! - director Yorgos Lanthimos and star Emma Stone deserve a rest. But there's no rest for the wicked, and the industrious pair are back in just a few weeks with the latest from the Greek auteur.
Kinds of Kindness is a triptych of stories, calling to mind Wes Anderson's similarly-structured three-parter The French Dispatch or Ryusuke Hamaguchi's Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy. The three chapters follow a man who tries to take control of his own life, a policeman whose wife seems like a different person, and a woman who searches for someone with a special ability.
With a starry cast including Jesse Plemons, Margaret Qualley, Joe Alwyn, Hong Chau, Hunter Schafer and more, fans of Poor Things and The Favourite are in for another twisted ride.
From 28 Jun | Book now | See it in 35mm at Picturehouse Central and The Cameo
Dìdi (弟弟), meaning 'younger brother', is the coming-of-age story of Chris: a thirteen-year-old Taiwanese boy growing up in Fremont, California in 2008.
Writer-director Sean Wang, making his feature debut, brings the clear warmth of personal memory to every scene. His short documentary Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó, a love letter to his grandmothers, was nominated for an Academy Award at this year's Oscars.
Dìdi dives into the online world of a mid-noughties teenager, and its digital sequences are imbued with wry humour. For many, the film will conjure vivid memories of pop punk blaring on MySpace homepages, "How to be Ninja" sitting at the top of the YouTube recommendation bar.
But audiences of all ages and backgrounds can connect to the rich, funny, painfully relatable agony of figuring out your place in the world.
From 02 Aug | See more
Our opening film kick-started the weekend with a burst of infectious energy, as audiences were introduced to writer-director Rich Peppiatt's Kneecap.
Belfast hip hop trio Kneecap star as gently fictionalised versions of themselves in this raucous comedy-drama, charting the rise of an unlikely sensation as Naoise Ó Cairealláin (aka Móglaí Bap) and Liam Óg Ó Hannaidh (aka Mo Chara) convince schoolteacher JJ Ó Dochartaigh (aka DJ Provaí) to form a group who rap in Irish Gaelic.
Kneecap premiered at the Utah festival back in January - the first film entirely in the Irish language to play at Sundance - and snapped up the Audience Award in the NEXT selection.
With its irreverent fierceness earning it comparisons to Trainspotting, expect to hear a lot more about these boys from Belfast.
From 23 Aug | See more
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