​10 films that stood out at Sundance 2022

It was going to be a redefining festival that blended physical and online, but the Omicron surge saw Sundance 2022 (Jan 20-30) revert to online-only at the last minute.

Disappointment for filmmakers, yes, but as Sundance pioneered the online format last year, and hasn’t been matched yet for sophistication and easy access, the industry was more than happy to pull up a sofa and watch, enthralled, as a chilling array of talent made their debuts. Genre ruled, but not as you know it. The deals were already happening by the first weekend and have continued to glide down the slopes ever since.

Navalny
Dir. Daniel Roher
This immediate, forceful piece about imprisoned Russian opposition leader Sergei Navalny took the audience prize overall, alongside the same prize in the US documentary category, so it’s already a crowdpleaser. It’s always extraordinary to watch history revealing itself to filmmakers, but Navalny also feels real-time as filmmaker Daniel Roher shoots in close-up while the outspoken politician is poisoned by Novichok, makes a truly miraculous escape, uncovers the plot against him and decides to fly home again into the jaws of the Russian bear.
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You Won’t Be Alone
Dir. Goran Stolevski
A stranger-than-strange witch story which played in the World Dramatic Competition and is handled by Focus, this Macedonian-set drama follows an unwilling sorceress through several incarnations. Truly unusual.
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Good Luck To You, Leo Grande
Dir. Sophie Hyde
Shot in a single hotel room – and a coffee shop – Sophie Hyde’s thoughtful drama was picked up by Searchlight mid-festival. It boasts a strong turn from Emma Thompson as a sexually frustrated older woman in search of release, but newcomer Daryl McCormack as the sex worker who tries to help her also impresses. Sensitive and respectful and coming to an awards campaign near you.
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Nanny
Dir. Nikyatu Jusu
This stunning debut from Nikyatu Jusu stars Anna Diop as a Senegalese migrant in New York who finds work as a nanny but is haunted from within – and without. Winner of the US dramatic prize.
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Cha Cha Real Smooth
Dir. Cooper Raiff
Fans of Cooper Raiff’s SXSW winner Shithouse will recognise the melancholy topnotes on this wistful, most endearing comedy picked up by Apple mid-festival. Starring Dakota Johnson and Raiff, whose presence is as warm and wryly amusing as in his first film.
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Living
Dir. Oliver Hermanus
Once you get over the fact that this is a remake of Kurosawa’s Ikiru – the audacity! – this Oliver Hermanus-directed drama starring Bill Nighy as a 1950s government stiff who receives a terminal diagnosis has considerable charms of its own.
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Fresh
Dir. Mimi Cave
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Watcher
Dir. Chloe Okuno
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These two genre films tackle the same female fears about vulnerability from different angles: the terror of dating and the constant danger that is never quite believed. Both debuts, directed by Mimi Cave and Chloe Okuno respectively, with excellent performances from Daisy Edgar-Jones and Maika Monroe as women under siege.

Master
Dir. Mariama Diallo 
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Alice
Dir. Krystin Ver Linden
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Another two female-directed films which use genre conventions to show audiences how terror is in the very bones of the world in which Black people live. New arrivals at a fancy New England college have to tread the boards their ancestors hung from in Mariama Diallo’s debut Master, while Krystin Ver Linden throws Keke Palmer from a slave plantation in Georgia into 1970s Blaxploitation in Alice, also a debut.

• Six talking points from Sundance 2022