Current:Home > reviews'In the Summers,' 'Didi' top Sundance awards. Here are more movies we loved. -Mastery Money Tools
'In the Summers,' 'Didi' top Sundance awards. Here are more movies we loved.
View
Date:2025-04-13 11:30:30
And that's another Sundance Film Festival, officially in the books.
On Friday, the annual gathering in snowy Park City, Utah, of movie lovers and Hollywood industry types – celebrating its 40th anniversary this year – announced the winners of its top prizes. "In the Summers," a decades-spanning epic about a man and his two daughters, received the U.S. dramatic Grand Jury Prize. "Didi," about a Taiwanese-American boy's last summer before high school, took home the festival's other major trophy, the U.S. dramatic audience award. "Porcelain War" and "Daughters" picked up top documentary trophies, while the NEXT Innovator Award went to satirical dramedy "Little Death," starring David Schwimmer as a TV writer with a midlife crisis.
If you missed out and want to experience Sundance from your couch, the festival has many of this year's movies (including award winners) available to watch on its online digital platform through Sunday.
These were our other favorite films from this year's Sundance lineup:
'Ghostlight'
Whenever you get a chance to watch this heartfelt flick – the closest thing Sundance had to "CODA" this year – have some tissues handy. Keith Kupferer is top notch in the dramedy as a middle-aged construction worker who's reluctantly recruited for an acting troupe's take on "Romeo and Juliet" and finds the plot mirrors a tragedy in his life that still haunts him. "Triangle of Sadness" breakout Dolly De Leon plays the main character's feisty stage partner and the star's daughter, Katherine Mallen Kupferer, is excellent as Dan's rebellious kid. – Brian Truitt
Sundance Film Festival:All the best movies we saw, ranked (including 'Love Me')
'Kneecap'
The quasi-biopic comedy, which won Sundance's NEXT audience award, is a crowd-pleasing, enjoyably anarchic introduction to the Irish-speaking hip-hop group's musical shenanigans and political leanings. Starring the real-life members of Kneecap, the wild and highly watchable journey of two childhood friends from Belfast and a music teacher features rap tunes, Michael Fassbender (as a complicated father figure), various cops and crooks and a youthful middle finger to a repressive establishment. – Truitt
'Ponyboi'
River Gallo is a revelation in this beguiling crime thriller, which is bound to become an unlikely Valentine’s Day classic with its sordid yet sneakily emotional tale of a New Jersey sex worker. The intersex actor has electric chemistry with Murray Bartlett (“The Last of Us”), who plays a tender cowboy with a penchant for Bruce Springsteen. And “Teen Wolf” heartthrob Dylan O’Brien brings the perfect amount of sleaze to a small-time pimp and drug dealer. ‒ Patrick Ryan
'A Real Pain'
If you dig Kieran Culkin in "Succession," he's just as salty – and equally as terrific – in Jesse Eisenberg's second directorial feature. The dramedy stars Eisenberg and Culkin as two estranged cousins who go on a Holocaust tour in Poland to reconnect with their Jewish heritage and honor their beloved grandma. They test the nerves of their tour group (and each other) while wading through their own issues in a funny and thoughtful dramedy about family expectations and dealing with the past. – Truitt
'Sebastian'
In Mikko Mäkelä’s bewitching erotic drama, a young gay journalist (Ruaridh Mollica) leads a double life: freelancing for a magazine as he pens his first novel while moonlighting as an escort. His sexual exploration begins as writing research, but the lines soon begin to blur as he grapples with shame, boundaries and how to truly be intimate with other men. “Sebastian” is a compelling story about the lengths we’ll go to for our art, and a genuinely steamy film that captures the beauty of queer sex. ‒ Ryan
veryGood! (2624)
Related
- Elon Musk's skyrocketing net worth: He's the first person with over $400 billion
- Kosovo’s president says investigators are dragging their feet over attacks on NATO peacekeepers
- Japan’s Kishida says China seafood ban contrasts with wide support for Fukushima water release
- Report blames deadly Iowa building collapse on removal of bricks and lack of shoring
- Could your smelly farts help science?
- Whoopi Goldberg misses season premiere of 'The View' due to COVID-19: 'Me and my mask'
- Voting online is very risky. But hundreds of thousands of people are already doing it
- 'We started celebrating': 70-year-old woman wins $452,886 from Michigan Lottery Fast Cash game
- The Best Stocking Stuffers Under $25
- Superbugs catch a ride on air pollution particles. Is that bad news for people?
Ranking
- 'Survivor' 47 finale, part one recap: 2 players were sent home. Who's left in the game?
- The president of a Japanese boy band company resigns and apologizes for founder’s sex abuse
- Mission underway to rescue American who fell ill while exploring deep cave in Turkey
- Kim Sejeong is opening the 'Door' to new era: Actress and singer talks first solo album
- Questlove charts 50 years of SNL musical hits (and misses)
- Daughter of long-imprisoned activist in Bahrain to return to island in bid to push for his release
- Florida man riding human-sized hamster wheel in Atlantic Ocean faces federal charges
- It's so hot at the U.S. Open that one participant is warning that a player is gonna die
Recommendation
Retirement planning: 3 crucial moves everyone should make before 2025
Catholic-Jewish research substantiates reports that Catholic convents sheltered Jews during WWII
The long road winding down at the World Cup, where semifinals await Team USA
Britney Spears Reveals How She Really Felt Dancing With a Snake During Her Iconic 2001 VMAs Performance
Who are the most valuable sports franchises? Forbes releases new list of top 50 teams
Another inmate dies at Fulton County Jail, 10th inmate death this year
‘Stop Cop City’ activists arrested after chaining themselves to bulldozer near Atlanta
Grizzly bear suspected of maulings near Yellowstone area killed after breaking into house