The film festival portion of SXSW has gained industry prominence every year since its inception, culminating this month with Everything Everywhere All at Once becoming the festival’s first Best Picture-winner at the Academy Awards. With the hope of that win in my brain and a 2020-deferred badge around my neck, I made my return to SXSW hoping to see as many movies as possible. Leaving a film festival having seen 10 good movies can feel impossible in a bad year, but I was lucky enough to find the ones that are genuinely deserving of your time and attention.

Bleeding Love

Directed by Emma Westenberg

My experience with this movie came in 3 waves of joy. The first being childlike joy as I stood in line for the film and witnessed Obi-Wan himself exit his car sporting a large and messy mustache. The second wave quickly followed, watching him snub all of the autograph hounds with their Star Wars posters as he entered the theater shortly before myself. But the final largest wave came from actually seeing the film and watching Ewan McGregor perform on-screen with his daughter, Clara, wherein they play fictionalized versions of themselves. Clara is at the center of this film, a young woman who recently had an overdose and is being roped into a cross-country road trip with her father as he coaxes her towards recovery. The story’s premise and structure are familiar enough, but it's these performances and Emma Westenberg’s direction that elevate this film above others in the deadbeat dad genre. Westenberg sees the chemistry between her leads and confidently strips away any movie magic between them and her audience to present something real and raw, only adding additional style to flashback sequences where smallness is a perspective and nostalgia a patina. This makes it easy to see how genuine this father/daughter relationship is, its moments of love or hate or resentment or awkwardness. You can tell it comes from someplace real, and the love between them makes You Sing Loud, I Sing Louder more than just a novelty.

Self Reliance

Directed by Jake Johnson

Jake Johnson is a SXSW regular at this point, so it would only make sense that he brings his first directed feature to this year’s lineup. Similarly, Jake Johnson’s character in Self Reliance is a regular in everything he acts in; a schlubby dude who’s afraid of change and confrontation but is cynically funny enough to skid by in life. Luckily, this is my MO so it's fun to watch Johnson nail the archetype, while also having the screenwriting license to put that character in whatever situation he pleases. The situation in question: a dark web assassination survival game show. The prize: $1 million. The catch: you can only be killed if you’re alone. If you think you know where this story is going, I’ll play the odds and say that you aren’t wrong. But despite this, I will say that the movie is hilarious and Jake’s chemistry with everyone in the cast is immensely charming. What’s more, I think this film and its subject matter take on much more meaning after the peaks of the COVID pandemic. Tommy’s fears of loneliness, dependency, familial excommunication, and death from strangers around you is now all too easy for the audience to tap into.

Evil Dead Rise

Directed by Lee Cronin

Hype for films in a festival is something I try not to get caught up in, but the promise of boomsticks and deadites swallowed me whole in the days prior and did not spit me out until the credits rolled. I’m so happy to say that humor is back in the Evil Dead films with an outing from Lee Cronin that keeps its foot on the gas and its tongue firmly in cheek. After Fede Alvarez brought back the franchise with 2013’s reboot, Cronin attempts to carry over some of its serious subject matter while bringing the humor of Sam Raimi’s sequels into an overgrown apartment that houses a mother and her family. Beyond an all-too-familiar setup that traps said family in the apartment, much of the camp comes from a fantastic performance by Alyssa Sutherland playing Ellie, the mother who is first to become a deadite and spends much of her screen time gleefully terrorizing her sister (Lily Sullivan) and 3 children. She’s a singular and well-utilized villain (a rarity in the Evil Dead franchise) whose sadistic joy is terrifying but impossible not to watch. Watching Lily Sillivan’s character rise to meet her and protect the children in the film is also portrayed wonderfully, with plenty of kills and callbacks that will satiate any fan of the franchise.

John Wick: Chapter 4

Directed by Chad Stahelski

Baba Yaga himself graced us with his presence at the not-so-secret Special Screening of this year’s fest with the most epic film I’ve seen in 5 years of attending. The crowd was salivating after forming a line over multiple hours, spanning multiple blocks, just for the chance to see Keanu and his near 3-hour epic with the first US audience. And despite such buildup, I can say without question that it was well worth the wait and showcases some of the best action I’ve ever seen on-screen. Everyone is on their A-game for this one, especially the new characters introduced in the beginning Osaka scenes. While they may eclipse screen time for older characters like the Bowery King, Donnie Yen’s Caine and Rina Sawayama’s Akira are such talented additions to the universe that I didn’t mind at all. But nothing stands in the way of John Wick himself, whose connections to characters old and now make for truly impactful scenes (even ones with no action). But enough cannot be said about Chad Stahelski’s direction and vision for this film. In less-experienced hands, these long action sequences could lose steam and become indulgent, but he somehow strings together set pieces that feel organic and sweeping. The final hour of this film is essentially nonstop action that never grew stale and elicited outright cheers not just for the characters, but for the craft on display. I’m not sure what’s next for the John Wick franchise after this, but I’ve never been more excited.

Chronicles of a Wandering Saint

Directed by Tomás Gómez Bustillo

I have a soft spot for movies about the elderly. Not the ones where they’re old but engage in youthful activities, but ones that make me worry that the twilight of my life may be filled with just as much emotional distress as it is now. Tomás Gómez Bustillo’s feature debut exists in this soft spot about an Argentinian woman named Rita whose whole life revolves around her competitive dedication to the Catholic Church. When she feels as though her banal contributions to the church are going unrecognized by her close-knit group of more-talented friends, she sees an opportunity to stage a miracle that can gain her notoriety in both this life and the afterlife. The premise I’ve described is basically the first half of the movie and is very much what you’d expect; a old woman desperate to gain attention attempts something morally ambiguous that has ensuing consequences. But it's the quiet humor and sincere sympathy provided in a performance from Mónica Villa that adds so much to the heart of Rita’s character, an old woman who is using religious contributions as a bargaining chip at the end of her life. As for the second half of the movie, I can’t discuss it without spoiling but there is a (literal) turn that drives this film into unexpected territory. Through limited dialogue and Bustillo’s unique visual choices, we find another familiar character journey that feels fresh and funny and heartbreaking right to the bittersweet end.

Theater Camp

Directed by Molly Gordon & Nick Lieberman

Far and away, this film made me laugh the most of any film I’ve seen so far this year. An expanded version of a short film from the same team, Theater Camp is a love letter to that titular place in many people’s lives, made by the theater kids that were forged there. The writing team of directors Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman, along with cast members Noah Galvin and Ben Platt, have crafted a story filled with self-awareness to the inherent silliness of theater camps and the characters therein. But all of this humor (much of it improvised) comes so obviously from a place of appreciation and love that never punches down, creating a safe space for the characters to feel comfortable being themselves and for the audience to find comforting humor in the experience. Gordon, Galvin, and Platt all play members of the teaching staff among a sea of other supporting characters that were all immediately hilarious and memorable (children included). As expected, their goal is to put on a successful production against all odds, but the performances fill this familiar plot with so much charm that it becomes undeniably infectious. Despite being set in the present day, the choice to shoot on Super 16 gives the film a timeless, grainy look that will keep this in sleepover rotations for years to come.

Monolith

Directed by Matt Vesely

This is the one I took home with me, and not just because it was the last film of the festival that I saw. After seeing Lilly Sullivan days earlier kicking deadite ass, I was interested to see her in a quieter film about a podcaster investigating an intriguing conspiracy, and she did not disappoint. Monolith is the exact type of film I go to SXSW to see; small, tense and confounding. Outside of sparse flashback sequences, most of the film is set in the living space of our main character, who is also the only one we see on-screen while all other characters only appear via phone audio. One could imagine how such constraints would be challenging for a performance but Sullivan delivers with a character whose relationships are strained, whose content may be unethical, and whose perspective is driven by obsession. Following only this character creates a delightfully challenging watch for the audience, who may not enjoy such a drawn out story with a salacious and disgusting ending. Early on I’ll say that I found some of director Matt Vesely’s choices inaccessible and even detrimental to the film’s pace, but this mistrust was a mistake. As I continue to dissect the film, I can say that every choice on his part dutifully serves the plot and themes, ones that we need in an age of fake news and grifting media “authorities.” If you’re an “elevated” horror fan, treat yourself to this movie as soon as it comes out.

Brooklyn 45

Directed by Ted Geoghegan

Chalk this up as my biggest surprise of the fest. I showed up late for my intended movie and took whatever was next to show, which happened to be this Shudder-produced film. I cautiously sat down for what I assumed to be a horror film and was delighted to come out of one of the best written dramas of the year. Brooklyn 45 takes place mostly in the same room of a New York brownstone in 1945, where a reunion of World War II veterans quickly turns tense when a surprise seance reveals more than just the existence of the afterlife. To call this a horror movie would be a massive misdirection, although the throwback film effects surrounding the seance are gloriously fun. In reality, this film has more in common with character dramas like 12 Angry Men, where the leads simply talk about their life experiences and clash with each other (verbally and physically) as their differences come to a head. For these characters, their differences surround the nature of their acts during WWII; who was righteous, who was following orders, who was motivated by prior biases, and what they do now that the enemy is defeated. With fascist rhetoric rising in this country, you may be able to predict what themes this film is going to tackle, but Ted Geoghegan’s writing is so tight, and the performances are so masterful that the film accomplishes the impressive feat of being both timely and timeless.

Americana

Directed by Tony Tost

With previous premieres of films like Blaze and The Peanut Butter Falcon, I’ve come to expect great selections of americana filmmaking at SXSW. This year’s example takes on the genre's name of Americana and is a promising directorial debut from Tony Tost. A neo-western in many respects, Tost’s writing has updated the classic “cowboys & indians” conflict for 2023 (now Capitalists & Communists) while leaving in religious and sexist characters that time has yet to forget. And while the story thrives in reframing and re-examining these past tropes of the genre, it leaves plenty of room for the cheesy romances and sweet southern characters that we remember fondly from films like Smokey and the Bandit or The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. The actors’ performances emit immediate charm from their first second on screen, with standouts including Halsey as Mandy Starr and Zahn McClarnon as Ghost Eye. The movie is also rooted in nostalgic settings and styles, structured into titled chapters (a la Coen Brothers & Tarantino) wherein new and prior characters weave in and out but converge at the same location by the end. But, despite all of these references and evocations to previous work, Tost never drowns in the nostalgia and manages to bring together a touching film that is every bit his own.

If You Were the Last

Directed by Kristian Mercado

Between masterworks like Gravity and The Martian, bringing something new to the space isolation genre might seem impossible. Not only are the genre’s lone characters isolated by their surroundings, but the scientific dwellings around them feel just as cold. But while references to these movies are made directly in If You Were the Last, writer Angela Bourassa and director Kristian Mercado manage to create a film that is all too different and warm. Instead of one lost soul, there are two, played wonderfully by Anthony Mackie and Zoe Chao, each a bubbly personality that brings different outlooks to their unknown situation. Conversations between them rarely breach their scientific occupations, focusing instead on their media preferences or masturbation techniques. It would be a mistake to call the dialogue fleeting or meaningless, as this sort of teenage whimsy truly fleshes out the characters that need each other to stay sane. Likewise, this childlike charm extends into the movie’s production design. The planets outside are paper mache, the rooms inside are homey with 80s-era furniture centered around cassette-based entertainment centers. Perhaps not scientifically accurate, but all of it feels “right,” like how a kid would decorate their room when playing astronauts. But even when the artifice is stripped away and reality forces its way into the plot, the characters still carry that charm and deliver an emotionally impactful ending. I cannot root for these characters or this movie enough, and am proud to call it my favorite film of the festival.

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All in all, my first post-pandemic film festival was quite a success. I had fun, and witnessing Austin as a beacon within the film industry is always a site to behold. See ya next year!

Top 10 Films of SXSW