After internet hosting digital occasions for 2 consecutive years, the Sundance Movie Pageant returned to its chilly, high-altitude residence of Park Metropolis, Utah, for an in-person celebration of cinema from January nineteenth to the twenty ninth. In the meantime, a handful of this 12 months’s promising choice continues to be obtainable on-line—in order numerous critics, celebrities, and business folks flocked to the primary main movie pageant of the 12 months, I spent the period binge-watching the cinematic choices from the consolation of my very own mattress. Sundance’s lineup this 12 months is a blended bag, that includes extremely anticipated titles that find yourself underwhelming, whereas the occasional standouts emerge triumphantly.

One such spotlight is documentarian Roger Ross Williams’s narrative function debut, Cassandro. A vibrant crowd-pleaser, the movie is, greater than something, a car for the immensely proficient Gael García Bernal, who delivers a superb and bodily efficiency within the title function. Set on the planet of Mexican Lucha Libre wrestling, Cassandro orbits (and barely ventures past) the purview of Saúl Armendáriz, a homosexual wrestler hailing from El Paso, Texas, who rises to stardom within the Eighties below his eponymous stage identify. Regardless of remaining throughout the confines of the acquainted sports-underdog-biopic components, Cassandro is a big-hearted and exhilarating tribute to the legacy of a queer icon.

One other movie that makes an attempt to touch upon male id is Journal Goals, which approaches the subject by way of a extra unfocused lens, however boasts a dedicated central efficiency from Jonathan Majors. Author-director Elijah Bynum presents a visceral character examine of an ungainly man named Killian Maddox (Majors), whose aspirations of changing into a bodybuilder evolve right into a rage-fueled obsession. When he’s not working at a grocery retailer and caring for his ailing grandfather, Killian pushes his physique to the intense—enduring a cycle of fixed consuming, steroid injections, weight-lifting, and competitions—to make a reputation for himself. The film takes on greater than it will possibly deal with as Bynum tries to cowl poisonous masculinity, trauma, and psychological well being whereas breezing previous any significant commentary. Regardless, Journal Goals is value seeing for the only goal of witnessing a star as charming as Majors command the display screen for 2 hours.

Among the many actor-driven titles, Sundance’s lineup has additionally been peppered with a slew of romances. The time period “erotic” has been tossed round, specifically in relation to Chloe Domont’s company thriller Honest Play and Ira Sachs’s achingly tender Passages. The outline aptly matches the latter: a sex-filled three-hander that oozes with a sensuality that trendy cinema typically lacks.

Together with his eighth function, Passages marks Sachs’s return to his model of low-key, brutally trustworthy dramas. In opposition to a Parisian backdrop, Passages stars German treasure Franz Rogowski as Tomas—an egotistical filmmaker who finds himself on the heart of a love triangle when he cheats on his softer husband, Martin (Ben Whishaw), with Adèle Exarchopoulos’s college instructor, Agathe. (He bluntly tells Martin the next morning, “I had intercourse with a girl. Can I let you know about it, please?”)

As Tomas oscillates between Martin and Agathe—first leaving his longtime accomplice to be with the brand new object of his affection earlier than rising jealous of Martin’s new rebound—the trio is caught in a dynamic that slowly eats away at their emotions. Rogowski’s chemistry together with his co-leads palpitates by way of the display screen, whereas Sachs’s mastery of growing messy and uncooked characters is on full view. I additionally should give a particular shoutout to the implausible wardrobe in Passages—particularly, the various mesh shirts and crop tops worn by Rogowski, together with Whishaw’s glorious knitwear.

After which there’s Honest Play: a movie that includes love, energy, and gender, all wrapped into one. Domont’s first function definitely evokes the erotic thrillers of previous eras—it has drawn many comparisons to Deadly Attraction—however Honest Play doesn’t essentially appear desirous about eroticism itself a lot as capturing the uneasy dynamics inside a pair that occurs to be, on the onset, very attractive. In one of many first scenes, the central couple, Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich), hook up within the rest room throughout his brother’s wedding ceremony celebration. Whereas cleansing themselves up, an engagement ring falls out of Luke’s pocket. Subsequent factor we all know, they’re fortunately engaged—however in fact, it will possibly’t be that straightforward.

Emily and Luke work on the identical high-pressure hedge fund, which implies their relationship is saved a secret—which will be attractive, till it all of the sudden isn’t. When Emily overhears that Luke could also be up for a promotion, she (actually) showers him with intercourse and Champagne. However the tables shortly flip when she finally ends up getting the coveted gig. Luke could appear comfortable for her, however her rising success has clearly fractured his ego, to the purpose the place he can’t fathom having intercourse together with her. To the dismay of some viewers, Domont chooses to strategy this energy shift with ambiguity, remaining impartial till the ultimate act. As an alternative, the filmmaker focuses on growing two fleshed-out, extremely flawed people who’re clearly doing extra hurt to one another than good. Like a handful of Sundance’s movies this 12 months, Honest Play might test all of the packing containers of what makes for a surefire hit—however it by no means holds again.