Tuesday Noon at Sundance: Cutie and the Boxer

Director: Zachary Heinzerling.  U.S.A., 2012, 81 min., Color. English/Japanese with English subtitles.  U.S. Documentary Competition.

Description:  “This candid New York love story explores the chaotic 40-year marriage of famed boxing painter Ushio Shinohara and his wife, Noriko.  Anxious to shed her role of assistant to her overbearing husband, Noriko seeks an identity of her own.”

Film opened with Noriko assisting Ushio in putting on boxing gloves which he then plunged into buckets of black paint and proceeded to punch a huge, wall sized white artist’s canvas to create a dramatic and fantastic painting.  Thus his reputation as a famed boxing painter.

Tuesday 8:30 a.m. at Sundance: The Way, Way Back

Directors and Screenwriters:  Nat Faxon, Jim Rash.  U.S.A., 2013, 96 min., color.

Cast:  Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Allison Janney, Sam Rockwell, Maya Rudolph, Liam James.

Description:  “Duncan, an introverted 14-year-old, comes into his own over the course of a comedic summer when he forms unlikely friendships with the gregarious manager of a rundown water park and the misfits who wok there.”

This was my fav.  And to think I almost missed it because I was tired and it was early in the morning.  In the Q&A they announced that it was picked up and would be in theaters in a few months.

Monday p.m. Sundance: The Moo Man

Director:  Andy Heathcote.  Codirector: Heike Bachelier.  United Kingdom, 2012, 98 Min., color

World Cinema Documentary Competition.  Opportunity for audience to vote on this film.

Description:  “A year in the life of heroic farmer Steve, scene-stealing Ida (queen of the herd), and a supporting cast of 55 cows. When Ida falls ill, Steve’s optimism is challenged, and their whole way of life is at stake.”

This was a charming and informative documentary.  I will never again say, “dumb as a cow.”

Monday a.m. at Sundance: The East

Director: Zal Batmanglij.  Screenwriters: Zal Batmanglij, Brit Marling.

Cast: Brit Marling, Alexander Skarsgard, Ellen Page, Toby Kebbell, Shiloh Fernandez, Patricia Clarkson.   U.S.A., 2012, 116 min., color.

Described as:  “An operative for an elite private intelligence firm goes into deep cover to infiltrate a mysterious anarchist collective attacking major corporations.  Bent on apprehending these fugitives, she finds her feelings growing for the group’s charismatic leader.”

Sundance logistics.

When I told you I was tired in Anita, it occurred to me that I needed to tell you how hectic it is.  The film Top of the Lake began at 9:00 a.m. but we had to be in the ticketed viewer line at least a half-hour before doors opened.   There is also a standby line and if you aren’t there your seat is given away.

Then there is parking.

Sunday PM at Sundance: “Anita”

Documentary Premier.  Director: Freida Mock.  U.S.A., 2013, 95 min., color.

Description:  “Anita Hill, an African American woman, charges Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas with sexual harassment in explosive Senate hearings in 1991 – bringing sexual politics into the national consciousness and fueling 20 years of international debate on the issues.”

Sunday at Sundance: “Top of the Lake”

Directors: Jane Campion and Garth Davis.  Screenwriters: Jane Campion and Gerard Lee

Cast:  Elizabeth Moss, Holly Hunter, Peter Mullan, David Wenham.   Premiere; Australia/New Zealand, 2012, 363 minutes, in Color

The film was described as:  “A 12-year-old girl stands chest-deep in a frozen lake.  She is five months pregnant, and won’t say who the father is.  Then she disappears.  So begins a haunting mystery that consumes a community.”

Sundance experience day 1: “Fat Shaker”

Fat Shaker is a New Frontier film. (New Frontier features films that  “expand, experiment with, and explode traditional narrative storytelling.”  Mohammad Shirvani is the Director and Screenwriter of this Iranian film produced in 2012.  The film was in color, in English/Farsi/Dari with English subtitles.