by Benjamin Leonard, Managing Editor, Zine, Best Boy

Like just about every other film festival, the 2021 Slamdance Film Festival is available virtually, making it available to a larger audience. In addition to that, it’s only $10 for a pass. I’ll be covering the festival and writing reviews of select films over the next few weeks. But before that, I thought I’d provide you with a rundown of what I’m looking forward to.

Of the nine narrative features, these two jumped out at me:

Hurrah, We Are Still Alive! is directed by Agnieszka Polska and the description reminds me of a book I read that, for the life of me, I can’t remember the title of. “An artistic commune of filmmakers awaits the return of the Director, who disappeared without a trace, despite his absence, the Director seems to control all of the troupe's actions.”

Man Under Table or: I’m Writing a Movie is directed by Noel David Taylor and is summarized, “In an anachronistic dystopian landscape, a beleaguered young man attempts to navigate his way through the indie film scene in LA.” What can I say, I’m a sucker for dystopian tales, probably because I grew up on a steady diet of Terry Gilliam films.

There are three documentary features I’m especially interested in:

Anatomy of Wings is directed by Nikiea Redmond & Kirsten D'Andrea Hollander and sounds like it might be a rough, but important ride. “Black and white, young and old, a group of women risk their personal identities to build a second family while creating a documentary-film across the inequities of their Baltimore City neighborhoods.”

In hopes of a lighter tale, there’s Bleeding Audio directed by Chelsea Christer. “From inspiring triumphs to heartbreaking setbacks, Bleeding Audio relives the explosive career of the Matches and what it means to succeed in the digital age of music.”

I am also pretty excited to watch Workhorse Queen, directed by Angela Washko. “After an unlikely casting onto a reality television show, 47-year old suburban telemarketer Ed Popil leaves his job to pursue a full-time entertainment industry career as his drag queen alter ego, 1960’s era housewife Mrs. Kasha Davis.” I always enjoy a “you’re never too old to find your true self” sort of story, much like Morgana from last year’s Fantasia Festival.

Slamdance also has six feature length films in a category they call “Breakouts” and there’s four of ‘em that I’m hoping to see:

A Black Rift Begins to Yawn is directed by Matthew Wade and seems to be a little weird with old-timey-tech and that’s always fun to me. “As two former classmates dig into their deceased professor’s set of cassette tapes, which possibly contain recordings of strange signals from beyond the stars, they begin to feel memories, the chronology of time, and their identities slip into obscurity.”

After America is directed by Jake Yuzna and seems to be another heavy, but important, story told from an interesting angle. “In 2019 a group of criminal justice de-escalation workers in Minneapolis embarked on a collaborative film project that used radical theater workshop techniques to explore their real-life struggles to escape the pressures of the American dream. The result, finished days before the murder of George Floyd, captures a city searching for what lies after America.”

Bad Attitude: The Art of Spain Rodriguez sounds like a raucous and touching story and isn’t it always better to have fun while you’re being moved? “‘Working-class Latino hood, crossed with crazy artist, crossed with left-wing radical,’ so the legendary underground cartoonist Spain Rodriguez is described in this intimate portrait by his wife, Emmy-nominated filmmaker Susan Stern.”

No Trace (Nulle Trace) is directed by Simon Lavoie. I was drawn to it because, as I said before, dystopian futures just call me in. “In a near future, a callous smuggler hardened by life guides a pious young woman and her child across the border to safety, unaware that their destinies are inescapably linked in this inhospitable land.”

There’s two films in the Spotlight category and 18th & Grand: The Olympic Auditorium Story, directed by Stephen DeBro, sounds like a fun time to be had by all. “A raucous, visceral Los Angeles tale—seen through the story of a 20th Century fight palace and the remarkable woman who ran it-—reveals battles over race, gender and identity that still roil America.”

On top of all those features, Slamdance is jam-packed with 93 shorts in five different categories (there’s even a category titled Department of Anarchy). The featured section is labeled “Unstoppable” and the stories told by creators with disabilities. Here’s the top three that interested me:

“A$$ Level is a comedic music video that celebrates life with a disability while paying homage to 90s dance videos” is directed by Alison Becker and looks to be a bit silly.

ENDOMIC is directed by Camille Hollett-French & Ipek Ensari and looks pretty informative. “An exhaustive meta-analytic review documenting a mysterious “women's” issue, otherwise known as endometriosis1 (1term used to describe a clinical etiology that thus far has only been identified in primates with a female reproductive system, an anatomical structure of decidedly lower importance in comparison to those of the male primate.)”

In what I’m hoping will be a humorous, WTF sort of tale, there’s Single directed by Ashley Eakin. “A girl born with one arm gets set-up on a blind date with a guy who has one hand, and she is pissed!”

Honestly, this is just the tip of the iceberg. There are also an “Episodes” and “Digital, Games and Interactive” categories as well as filmmaker Q&As. Slamdance has a massive program of films this year and getting a pass for ten bucks is a hell of a deal. I hope to see ya there!