The movie that probably has the most local interest is the documentary Seized, about the raid on the Marion County Record newspaper in Marion, KS. As a public radio listener, you’ve probably heard plenty about the incident, but this movie presents a whole lot of footage I’d never seen, and gives us plenty of context that shows us the whole thing is representative of larger attacks on the media and the First Amendment, but also that it’s about the small-scale power struggles and pettiness that exist in essentially every town and city in the United States. The film shows us all of this in a much more entertaining way than we might have expected—not that it doesn’t treat the issues seriously, but it has an almost jaunty tone at times, and we’re given a fantastic movie character in newspaper publisher Eric Meyer.
I really enjoyed the Indonesian movie Levitating, about a teenager in a rural town who dreams of becoming a spirit channeler, which means he plays his flute-like instrument at huge trance parties while helping the dancers around him become possessed by various animal spirits, including cows, turtles, birds, and even leeches. On top of that, the local trance school has to save itself by raising enough money to outbid the huge corporation that wants to buy its land from under it, which means, of course, it’s time to throw a huge trance party fundraiser. It’s all so strange and creative and exciting and funny, a wildly good time that’s chock full of imagination.
One of the very best movies I saw is the Persian film The Friend’s House is Here, which provides an incredibly valuable portrait of artists in Tehran, so valuable because much of the film is them simply living their lives, while here in the U.S. we rarely get to see such things from Iran. It’s inspiring and affecting and reinforces the importance of art and small acts of resistance.
You can find all of Fletcher’s coverage of this year’s Sundance Film Festival here
