DIFRET

By far the best film seen at this year’s festival, this totally arresting, emotionally raw and eloquent film tells the true story of Hirut (the revelation that is Tizita Hagere), a willful 14 year old girl abducted on the way home from school one afternoon outside of her Ethiopian village. According to local tradition, a young girl can be abducted against her will and forced into marriage if a man chooses her. This time, however, Hirut outsmarts her captors and ends up killing her would-be betrothed husband. What ensues is a battle for justice, basic rights and the quest of one woman (the remarkable Meron Getnet), a lawyer specializing in rights for all Ethiopian women, to prove that certain ‘traditions’ must change.

HELLION

An incredibly well-acted account of young boys at the mercy of their circumstances, Hellion features performances by two very gifted young men: Josh Wiggins (in his debut) and Deke Garner, as brothers who have lost their mother and are left to their own devices as their alcoholic father (Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul) becomes increasingly untethered. Interestingly, both actors found their way to this film after having been featured in shorts on YouTube. With exceptional performances all around, notably from a powerful and mature Juliette Lewis as the boys’ aunt with maternal leanings, Hellion scores as a gritty American work that comments on family, class, grief and the bond of brothers.

I ORIGINS

One of the most inventive films at the festival this year, I Origins is a sweeping story involving science, spirituality, love, death and the prospect of reincarnation. Starring Michael Pitt (Hedwig & the Angry Inch), Brit Marling (the gorgeous and talented actress from this director’s previous film, the masterful Another Earth), and Astrid Bergès-Frisbey, Origins is a haunting and immersive experience with an excellent supporting performance by the young Kashish, playing a little girl from the slums of Delhi who may be a lot more than she seems…

THE SKELETON TWINS

Alternatingly dark and hilarious, The Skeleton Twins is a tart family tale that gives comedians Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig more than enough room to truly flex their dramatic muscles. Hader in particular is heartbreaking as a stalled actor awash in disappointment in himself, who is taken in by his twin sister (Wiig) after trying to end his own life. Little does he know, she is battling similar demons. The pair knock it out of the park, simultaneously depressing and engrossing the viewer, demonstrating the often difficult path one must take navigating life from young adulthood into the phase that follows. The film works in spite of some hazy backstory—it’s not entirely clear what got them to where they were—but with gleeful moments of lightness and irreverent comedy (the siblings share a complicit chemistry that is only possible amongst such gifted comedic actors), this one is sure to be a huge hit.

SEPIDEH

A touching and penetrative documentary exploring the unbridled desire of one Iranian teenage girl, Sepideh, to become an astronomer and ultimately an astronaut. Inspired by her personal hero Anousheh Ansari, the first Iranian to travel to space, 16-year-old Sepideh uses “the sky to vent the stress that society gives us.” Up against tradition, her domineering uncle and the culture around her at large, the stubborn and tireless young girl never lets go of her dreams for an instant, deeply inspiring us in the process. As an aside, this is a welcome peek into a Middle Eastern culture that does not directly involve the usual go-to subjects of politics, terrorism or poverty. Although sometimes a touch posed feeling, the documentary probes the expansive Iranian landscape and finds stargazers who all share one collective desire: to know what it’s like to leave Earth. Director Berit Madsen says that with Sepideh, she was able to watch her subject grow from a stubborn girl into a driven woman, one who refuses to be told ‘no’ when it comes to her dreams.

LIFE AFTER BETH

This is what Warm Bodies should have been. While by no means a resounding success, this film is a much more coherent genre mashup of Zombie and Rom-com, starring a rowdy Aubrey Plaza as the titular Beth who suffers a fatal snakebite and then inexplicably comes back. With the unexpected (and misguided?) casting of Dane DeHaan as the lead and Beth’s still-living boyfriend, Beth has moments that hit the nail on the head and others that don’t, but on the whole this is a fun and frothy zombie comedy with bite. Look for fun performances by John C. Reilly, Cheryl Hines, Molly Shannon and Paul Riser as the life-crossed lovers’ parents.

COOTIES

The other Sundance zombie movie, this standard fare and bloody B-movie puts a school-aged spin on the usual flesh-eating shenanigans: what if the problem started when an unsuspecting elementary school kid bites into a disgustingly infected chicken nugget in the cafeteria? While by no means reinventing the wheel, this freewheeling, blood-splattering campy horror comedy puts the kids in the villain’s seat and features some surprising name actors: Elijah Wood (familiar with this genre after 1998’s underrated The Faculty), Alison Pill (a talented actress playing against type here as the bimbo) and Rainn Wilson, who is sure to draw the most laughs as he kicks some grade school butt. Irreverent, messy and very very ridiculous.

RICH HILL

An almost ethereal, exceptionally well-shot documentary surrounding three youths living with their families in poverty-stricken Rich Hill, Mo., this documentary has a little trouble deciding what it wants to be about. It’s fascinating how one subject, the good-natured Andrew, looks at his surroundings as an idyll: his meek parents are all but inept, but he has a nurturing relationship with his adoring younger sister and remains optimistic about life. On the other hand, Harley, a troubled and unstable adolescent battling weight problems and already a chain smoker, looks at his life in the same town as hell—it’s not lost on the documentarians that his aggressive and equally troubled mother may have a lot more to do with her son’s outlook than she realizes. Outside of this, it’s unclear what the takeaway is here.

WHITE BIRD IN A BLIZZARD

Like two films in one, Gregg Araki’s (The Doom Generation) new film—his first in four years—is lopsided and inconsistent at best. The most evocative and lasting element, of course, is Shailene Woodley—the searing reality which this actress effortlessly exudes clashes inharmoniously with the off-kilter, over the top world of her parents (played in way too broad strokes by Christopher Meloni and Eva Green). Woodley portrays a high school teen whose mother (Green) suddenly goes missing one day, after months and years of increasingly bizarre behavior. The bizarre part, though, is how surprised she is about it, since the film slowly reveals just how comically insane her mother became. The major problems in this film’s tone are not helped by cliché supporting performances by (the miscast) Gabourey Sibide and Thomas Jane.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS

A meandering, hipstery fable of not-that-much, Happy Christmas stars Anna Kendrick as a typically listless young woman visiting her brother around the holidays. Surprisingly similar to Laggies, this film doesn’t trouble itself with an explanation as to why Jenny (Kendrick) behaves the way she does—often getting so drunk that she becomes a menace of sorts. While she doesn’t lose the connection with the audience as much as Knightley does in Laggies, her performance is more than eclipsed by superior supporting turns from talented veteran young actors Melanie Lynskey (Ever After) and Marc Webber (also an attribute in Laggies).

LAGGIES

A lagging, fickle film that fails to win an ounce of sympathy for its protagonist, Laggies follows a 20/30-something young woman who can’t quite advance past high school. While Keira Knightley does an excellent job of shedding her British hoighty-toightiness to become Megan, a somewhat lost girl in Seattle who lies to her boyfriend after he proposes just to ‘get away from it all’, the script not once gives us a peek into what ‘it all’ is; why does she feel so untethered? If anything, she destroys all possibility of support from the audience, since her onscreen chemistry with her fiancé (the adorable Marc Webber) is so electric. With a blasé supporting performance from Chloe Moretz as the high schooler Megan inexplicably befriends, the suffering Laggies is helped by the always-entertaining Sam Rockwell, as Megan’s new love interest.