"And yet so much of the film community's focus has been wrenched out of the past into an urgent present and uncertain future. The horrific killing, attacks, and raids in Minneapolis rightfully overshadowed a weekend intended for buzzy discoveries and bidding wars. Instead, guests prioritized what was going on outside of Park City, wearing ICE Out pins and protesting on Main St."
"But the movies, while you're with them, always live in the now, and Sundance's annual slate of Episodic series - those lucky TV shows that get to be seen on the big screen - proved especially attuned to the present. It's not that titles like "Worried," "Freelance," and "Soft Boil" deal directly with federally commissioned attack squads or the global rise in authoritarianism. It's that they focus on people who are clearly going through it - in the big and small picture, as part of a group or acutely within their own heads."
The 2026 Sundance Film Festival concluded its last year in Park City, Utah, where nostalgia surfaced across screenings and snowy post-premiere moments. Violent killings, attacks, and raids in Minneapolis overshadowed the festival weekend and shifted attendee priorities toward protests and visible solidarity such as ICE Out pins. Conversations centered on the festival's impending move to Boulder, Colorado, and which traditions should be preserved or altered. The festival's Episodic selections highlighted series that foreground characters coping with immediate personal and collective challenges, emphasizing resilience, daily perseverance, and intimate human experience over direct political exposition.
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