Tag: Sundance Film Festival

Sylvie’s Love

a/k/a Sylvie

Release Date:  12/25/20; Amazon (Original Release – 1/27/20 – Sundance Film Festival)
Genre:  Drama/Romance
Rating:   PG-13
Director:  Eugene Ashe
Studio(s):   Iam21 Entertainment
Running Time:  114 mins.

Cast:  Tessa Thompson, Nnamdi Asomugha, Eva Longoria, Aja Naomi King, Wendi Mclendon-Covey, Jemima Kirke

Story:  The jazz is smooth and the air sultry in the New York summer of 1957. Sylvie helps around her father’s record store as she waits for her fiancé to return from war—until sweet saxophonist Robert walks in looking for a day job to subsidize his residency at the Blue Morocco lounge. This chance meeting kindles a deep passion in each of them unlike anything they’ve felt before. Sylvie’s mother immediately disapproves and reminds Sylvie of her engagement, while Robert’s band books their first big gig overseas. As time passes, the sexual revolution begins, and Motown becomes king, the two fall in and out of each other’s arms, but never out of love.  Sundance.org.

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Charm City Kings

a/k/a Twelve
a/k/a 12 O’Clock Boys

Release Date:   1/27/20 – Sundance Film Festival; 4/10/20 – In Theaters
Genre:  Drama
Rating:   R
Director:  Angel Manuel Soto
Studio(s):  Overbrook Entertainment, Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE)
Running Time:  125 mins.
Cast:   Jahi Di’Allo Winston, Meek Mill, Will Catlett, Teyonah Parris, Donielle Tremaine Hansley, Kezii Curtis

Story:  Fourteen-year-old Mouse (Jahi Di’Allo Winston) desperately wants to join the Midnight Clique, an infamous group of Baltimore dirt-bike riders who rule the summertime streets. His older brother, Stro, was their top rider before his tragic death—a loss that consumes Mouse as much as his passion for bikes. Mouse’s mom (Teyonah Parris) and his police mentor, Detective Rivers (William Catlett), work overtime to help the charismatic teen reach his full potential, but when the Midnight Clique’s leader, Blax (Meek Mill), takes the boy under his wing, the lure of revving his own dirt bike skids Mouse toward a road way past the straight and narrow.  Source:  Sundance.org.

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Farewell Amor

Release Date:   12/11/20; MUBI (Original Release – 1/25/20 – Sundance Film Festival)
Genre:   Drama
Rating:  NR
Director:   Ekwa Msangi
Studio(s):   Outrageous Pictures, Park Pictures, Department of Motion Pictures, Jhumka Films, Lucky 13 Productions, MACRO, MUBI, Outrageous Pictures, Wavelength Productions, IFC Films, Netflix.
Running Time:  95 mins.
Cast:   Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine, Zainab Jah, Jayme Lawson, Joie Lee, Marcus Scribner, Nana Mensah.

Story:   It’s been 17 years since Walter was forced to leave his family in Angola. Now he is picking up his wife, Esther, and daughter, Sylvia, from the airport to bring them home to his one-bedroom Brooklyn apartment. The reunion isn’t seamless. Walter cooks a welcome dinner, and Esther wonders who taught him how to cook. Before they eat, Esther says grace, revealing her thunderous new passion for Jesus. And later, Walter realizes that he has not moved on from Linda, his lover who moved out of his apartment to make way for the family. When young Sylvia starts to explore the city and takes part in a dance competition, she unexpectedly opens up a pathway of muscle memory for the family to rediscover one another.  Source:  Sundance.org.

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The Forty-Year-Old Version

Release Date: 10/9/20; Netflix (Original Release- 1/25/20 – Sundance Film Festival)
Genre:   Comedy
Rating:  NR
Black & White
Director:  Radha Blank
Studio(s):   Hillman Grad
Running Time:  129 mins.
Cast:   Radha Blank, Peter Kim, Oswin Benjamin, Reed Birney, Imani Lewis, T.J. Atoms

Story:    Radha, a once-promising playwright, is barreling toward the stigma of being single and a struggling artist at the age of 40. Facing nonstop rejections from the theatre community while teaching a motley group of teens, she becomes creatively re-invigorated when she returns to rapping, her long-forgotten passion.  When her play finally gets going, however, she puts recording a rap demo on the back burner and must navigate the awful tension of compromising her voice for career success.  Source:  Sundance.org.

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Zola

Release Date:  6/30/21; In Theaters (Original Release: 1/24/20 – Sundance Film Festival)
Genre:   Drama
Rating:   R
Director:   Janicza Bravo
Studio(s):   Killer Films, Gigi Films, Ramona Films, A24.
Running Time:   90 mins.
Cast:   Taylour Paige, Riley Keough, Nicholas Braun, Colman Domingo

Story:  “You wanna hear a story about why me & this bitch here fell out? It’s kind of long but full of suspense.”  Zola meets Jessica at a restaurant where Zola waitresses, and the two immediately click over pole dancing. Only a day after they exchange numbers, Jessica invites Zola on a cross-country road trip, where the goal is to make as much money as possible dancing in Florida strip clubs. Zola agrees, and suddenly she is trapped in the craziest, most unexpected trip of her life.  Source:  Sundance.org.

 

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Miss Juneteenth

 

Release Date:   6/19/2020; Digital Release (Original Release – 1/30/20; Sundance Film Festival)
Genre:  Drama
Rating:   NR
Director:  Channing Godfrey Peoples
Studio:   Sailor Bear
Running Time:  103 mins.

Cast:   Nicole Beharie, Kendrick Sampson, Alexis Chikaeze, Lori Hayes, Marcus Maudlin.

Details:   Vertical Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Miss Juneteenth, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival and later won an award at SXSW. The feature is aiming for a June 19 release, that date marking the 155th anniversary of the Juneteenth holiday.

Story:  Built like a bird, Turquoise Jones is a single mom who holds down a household, a rebellious teenager, and pretty much everything that goes down at Wayman’s BBQ & Lounge. Turquoise is also a bona fide beauty queen—she was once crowned Miss Juneteenth, a title commemorating the day slavery was abolished in Texas. Life didn’t turn out as beautifully as the title promised, but Turquoise, determined to right her wrongs, is cultivating her daughter, Kai, to become Miss Juneteenth, even if Kai wants something else.  Source(s):  Deadline; Sundance.org.

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