12 Days

I know of 8 movies that I'm going to see at Sundance so far. After reading the summaries, I have to say, I'm pretty excited about it. Two of the 8 were in my top 5 and I'll reveal those and the rest of the movies I know next post.

Obselidia (U.S. Drama)
Believing he's the last door-to-door encyclopedia salesman in the world, George decides to write The Obselidia, a compendium of obsolete things. George believes that love, among other things, is obsolete. In his quest to document nearly extinct occupations, he befriends Sophie, a beautiful cinema projectionist who works at a silent movie theatre. Sophie believes the world's population will be obliterated by irreversible climate change by the year 2100, the two must face the question, if the world is going to disappear tomorrow, how are we going to live today? Obselidia offers a rare and humane lens through which we can view a world increasingly preoccupied with and inhabited by extinction.

Life 2.0 (Documentary Spotlight)
Every day, across all corners of the globe, hundreds of thousands of users log ont Second Life, a virtual online world not entirely unlike our own. They enter a new reality, whose inhabitants assume alternate personas in the form of avatars-digital alter egos that can be sculpted and manipulated to the heart's desire, representing reality, fantasy, or a healthy mix of both. Within this alternate landscape, escapism abounds, relationships are formed, and a real-world economy thrives, effectively blurring the lines between reality and "virtual" reality. Director Jason Spingarn-Koff digs deeply into the core of basic human interaction by assuming his own avatar and immersing himself in the worlds of Second Life residents, whose real lives have been drastically transformed by the new lives they lead in cyberspace. In doing so, he manages to create an intimate, character-based drama that focuses us to question not only who we are, but who we long to be.

It's a Wonderful Afterlife (World Premiere, Comedy)
with nods to Frank Capra, ghost stories, murder mysteries, and screwball comedies, Gurinder Chadha whips up an irreverent caper about the pressures on Indian women to tie the know. Set in West Londong, the film centers on Mrs. Sethi, a doting Punjabi mother obsessively seeking a suitor for her appealing, but (heaven forbid!) rapidly aging, daughter, Roopie. When a string of curious murders involving poisonous curries and chapati dough begins to rattle the neighborhood, things really start to heat up. Detectives and ghosts trample through the Sethi household, Roopie's love live gets an injection of excitement, too. Nothing in this supernatural escapade is as it seems as spicy truths unspool and fate takes its madcap course.

All of these movies sound interesting, but I'm especially interested in Life 2.0. I think it will be an eye-opening movie about how significant number of people use this world to be what they wanted to be in their real life. It will bring up a lot of questions no doubt about role playing games in general, but especially Second Life. Obselidia sounds interesting in that I'm curious to see what is considered to be obsolete and the questions the movie raises. I can't say I was jumping up and down about It's a Wonderful Afterlife, but who knows, it could be a good movie. I'll just need to wait and see.