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| Clemency Photo: Courtesy of Sundance Film Festival |
The festival's gala films come fresh from world premieres in Sundance - opening with Chinonye Chukwu's death row drama Clemency, which won the US Dramatic Grand Jury Prize, closing with Pippa Bianco's Share, about a young woman navigating the fallout from a viral video, and featuring Alejandro Landes' child soldier thriller Monos as its centrepiece, which won the World Dramatic Special Jury Prize.
The festival will feature 24 feature films and 11 shorts from 29 countries, including two world premieres and two world premieres. Fifteen of the films are directed or co-directed by women and 11 are by first-time feature directors.
Other films of note in the line-up, include Phuttiphong Aroonpheng’s feature directorial debut Manta Ray, which explores the plight of refugees in Thailand and which took home the top prize in the Horizons section of Venice Film Festival last year and Eva Trobisch's All Good, which tracks a woman in the aftermath of a rape. Other winners fresh from Sundance include Macedonian documentary Honeyland - which shows the world of a wild beekeeper colliding with a new family in her village - which won the World Documentary Grand Jury Prize, and Midnight Family, which explores a private ambulance in Mexico city and which took home the US Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematography.
Lila Avilés’s intimate character study The Chambermaid also continues its festival travels, while the UK is represented by Mark Jenkin's Bait, which was shot on hand-processed black-and-white film.
Celeste Bartos chief curator of film at MoMA Rajendra Roy said: “Demanding our attention and exemplifying the vitality of contemporary cinema, this year's class of emerging directors is one of the most courageous in years. Ready to investigate the deepest pain as well as celebrate profound humanity, these filmmakers are the brave new champions of our beloved art form.”
Director of programming Dennis Lim added: “Spanning the globe and a wide spectrum of styles and concerns, the bold and brilliant films in this year’s New Directors lineup are collective proof that cinema is still as supple a medium as ever.”
Tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday, March 8 at noon.
The full line-up, along with early reviews, can be seen here
