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5 doc picks from Sundance

5 doc picks from Sundance

Priority viewing for your Sundance list

Jan 22, 2025
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5 doc picks from Sundance
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ONES TO WATCH: SUNDANCE TIP SHEET

Ready or not, Sundance begins tomorrow. Read our report on Debut Directors and follow our Instagram at @PureNonfiction for filmmaker takeovers during the fest. I’ll be in Park City for the first half of the festival and moderating a panel on Monday, January 27 at 2:45pm MST at The Impact Lounge with filmmaker Adam Elliot and Switchboard Magazine Editor-in-chief, Celia Aniscovich about the magazines’ first programmed short, David Again, directed by Adam.

Register for the panel here

Our podcast host Thom Powers gained an early look at many of the docs premiering at the festival and he shares 5 tips below for films playing in the World Documentary Competition:

  • 2000 Meters to Andriivka directed by Mstyslav Chernov

  • Coexistence, My Ass! directed by Amber Fares

  • Cutting Through Rocks directed by Sara Khaki and Mohammadreza Eyni

  • The Dating Game directed by Violet Du Feng

  • How to Build a Library directed by Maia Lekow and Christopher King

Below are Thom’s quick takes on these films…

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LEFT ME THE MOST SHAKEN

Still from 2000 Meters to Andriivka

2000 Meters to Andriivka directed by Mstyslav Chernov

Amid the failing counteroffensive, a journalist follows a Ukrainian platoon on their mission to traverse one mile of heavily fortified forest and liberate a strategic village from Russian occupation. But the farther they advance through their destroyed homeland, the more they realize that this war may never end.

Thom’s take: Director Mstyslav Chernov is the AP cameraman turned documentary maker who had a stunning debut with 20 Days in Mariupol that deservingly won multiple awards including an Oscar and a Peabody. Now he returns to the front lines of Ukraine for a work that’s even more intense 2000 Meters to Andriivka. The film draws upon footage taken from body cameras worn by Ukrainian soldiers as they undertook a long and bloody battle to reclaim the town of Andriivka from Russian forces, combined with material that Mstyslav shot himself. But he has other layers to explore than the immediacy of combat. He opens the film with a line by Ernest Hemingway from A Farewell to Arms: “There were many words that you could not stand to hear and finally only the names of places had dignity.” Certainly, anyone who sees these films will never forget the names of Mariupol and Andriivka.

Mstyslav Chernov on Pure Nonfiction

2000 Meters to Andriivka premieres on January 23, 5pm MST at The Ray Theatre

All in-person and virtual screenings

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