If we've survived the Golden Globes, if the Oscar nominations have been announced and if the nation's television critics have finished getting the lowdown on what's new for the next six months, it can only mean one thing: Sundance Film Festival time.
The 32nd edition of what has become America's greatest film festival is just days away, but the Sundance Institute is still coming off a high from last year's edition. For the second time in the festival's history, two world premieres, “Boyhood” and “Whiplash,” were nominated for the Best Picture Oscar.* The 2014 festival also made a comeback at the box office, delivering indie hits such as “A Most Wanted Man,” “Obvious Child,” “Dear White People” and “The Skeleton Twins.” For 2015, the festival programmers have promised even more laughs, but, as always, continue to mix in some intriguing hot topics in the documentary categories.
This year's Sundance will also find two Cobie Smulders movies (“Results,” “Unexpected”), two Kristen Wiig movies (“Nasty Baby,” “Diary of a Teenage Girl”), a potential Keanu Reeves comeback vehicle (“Knock Knock”), another Josh Charles indie (“I Smile Back”), Ewan McGregor as Jesus (“Last Days in the Desert”), Taylor Schilling's first film since breaking out on “Orange is the New Black” (“The Overnight”) and a very curious doc about Scientology and Hollywood, among other topics. There may be something for almost everyone, and you'll eventually see many of these movies at your local art house or multiplex (or maybe even Netflix or Amazon first).
Keeping all that in mind, HitFix's Sundance crew has ranked our 25 most anticipated films to see at this year's festival, which you can find in the embedded story gallery below.
Agree? Disagree? Is there something else you really want us to make sure we review first? Share your thoughts in the comments section.
*An early version of this post mistakenly noted that this was the “first time.” “Precious” and “An Education” were both nominated in 2010.