Earlier today Sundance revealed their Premieres line-up, and all it's done is get me more amped up to hit Park City in January. With the announcement came a slew of new images, but here are just a handful from some of the films I'm anticipating most...
First up is Lovelace, which feels like it's been in the works for a lifetime. We're no longer talking about the dueling race to produce a Linda Lovelace biopic, as Inferno(which starred Malin Akerman) seems to have fallen by the wayside. Lovelace stars Amanda Seyfried(Les Miserables) as the infamous Deep Throat porn star, and she's joined by a top notch cast including James Franco, Sharon Stone, Adam Brody, Bobby Cannavale, Robert Patrick, Chloe Sevigny, and Peter Sarsgaard as her husband Chuck Traynor.
Zal Batmanglij and Brit Marling made their big splash at Sundance with Another Earth and the vastly underrated Sound Of My Voice, so it makes sense for them to return to Park City for their next film, The East. Marling stars alongside Alexander Skarsgard, Ellen Page, and Patricia Clarkson in a thriller following a private intelligence officer who infiltrates an anarchist group attacking corporations.
Prince Avalanche came out of nowhere last summer as a surprise project from David Gordon Green(The Sitter), starring Emile Hirsch and Paul Rudd. A remake of the Icelandic film, Either Way, it centers on two highway road workers who spend the summer of 1988 away from their city lives. The isolated landscape becomes a place of misadventure as the men find themselves at odds with each other and the women they left behind.
The latest film from Michael Winterbottom is The Look of Love(formerly The King of Soho),which stars Steve Coogan as entrepreneur/pornographer Paul Raymond. He amassed his fortune by buying up a ton of property and then opening the famous nightclub, Revuebar. But all of his wealth didn't stop his world from falling apart and losing everyone close to him. Anna Friel, Tamsin Egerton, and Imogen Poots co-star.
Hey, I don't like the sound of Ashton Kutcher as Apple founder Steve Jobs anymore than you do, but it's happening so we might as well get ready for it. The first image from jOBS shows Kutcher in the title role, and the only thing that looks about right is the dude's desk. Perhaps the supporting cast can pick up the slack, with J.K. Simmons, Josh Gad, Dermot Mulroney, Matthew Modine, and Lukas Haas helping to chronicle 30 years in Jobs' life.
Elisabeth Olsen has had a field day with Sundance the last two years, making her big splash with 2011's Martha Marcy May Marlene, before following it up last January with Red Lights and Liberal Arts. She's hoping to find similar success next time with Very Good Girls, starring opposite Dakota Fanning in the directorial debut from Naomi Foner(The Electric Company). The story takes place during a long, hot New York summer when two girls on the cusp of womanhood fall in love with the same guy. If this film does well they may just send all of Olsen's stuff through Sundance first.
Previously known as The Grandmothers, until somebody realized nobody wants to see that movie, Two Mothers stars Naomi Watts and Robin Wright as best friends who fall in love with each other's sons.The film promises a gripping tale of love, lust, friendship, and passion, written by Christopher Hampton(A Dangerous Method) and directed by Anne Fontaine(Coco Before Chanel).
Just like last year I'll be packing my warmest winter coat and snow shoes, hitting the Sundance Film Festival when it kicks off on January 17th.
