Getting ready for the Sundance Film Festival can be very exciting. As we await the event’s Thursday opening, we can’t stop wondering what will be the next big thing. Will this year’s hit be the highly-anticipated Michael Cera project Paper Hearts, or will it be something that we as of yet know nothing about?
It’s easy to forget, however, that oftentimes the next big thing is also the next lamest thing. Sundance sensations, those films that are much-buzzed-about, that sell for a lot of money, that go on to be marketed like crazy and ultimately receive Oscar recognition, tend to lend themselves most easily to backlashes. Usually such derision is deserved, as in the case of the following ten films, each of which made a big splash at Sundance despite being bad.
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It’s been 15 years since Jennifer Lynch directed Boxing Helena, and the intervening years have seemingly cooled her directorial genes, because Surveillance is much easier to swallow, although the subject matter is still upsetting to the stomach. The film takes an interesting premise and manages it to cram it through a meat grinder until you’re left with something that you wouldn’t really want to eat in the first place. Rather than the commentary on surveillance that the film starts to establish in the beginning, you’re left with what feels like an homage to Natural Born Killers.
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