What to avoid at Sundance London

28 April, 2012
by: Naima Khan

Naima Khan takes you through the film duds and what not to waste your money on at Sundance London.

We should start by telling you there are only 14 feature films showing at Sundance London so a Top 10 would be pretty useless. But we've taken those 14 and sorted them into some handy categories for you. These are the ones you should really not waste your time on. Click here to see the Sundance screenings we recommend.

Safety Not Guaranteed
Do you like moody girls who wear lots of eye-liner? Do you like frigid Indian geeks who are predictably into gaming? Do you like clichéd Casanovas secretly looking for love but masking it with lots of sex? Well then, neither you, nor this film belong at Sundance.

For Ellen
Oh my, whoever told writer director So Yong-Kim she had enough of an idea to flesh out a 93 minute-long feature film is responsible for at least 70 minutes worth of wasted celluloid. A struggling, lazy, usually wasted musician struggles to gain legal access to the daughter he's estranged from and when he does, he struggles to develop a connection with her, as you probably will with this over-indulgent writer-directed film.

Nobody Walks
Lena Dunham and Ry Russo-Young's take on the fragility of family and the steep post-graduation learning curve is rooted in Lena's exceptionally well constructed female characters. But this film is unforgivably mainstream. It's not the stars John Krasinski and Olivia Thirlby - who you'll recognise from Juno - they are excellent in their roles, but Nobody Walks sits far too comfortably in the sunny suburbs of LA and fails to say anything new.

Filly Brown
An eye-roll inducing premise gives way to some very patchy storytelling in this “hip-hop movie” that sees a young American Latina struggle with her dreams of becoming a serious rapper and the practicalities of taking care of her family after her mother is imprisoned on drugs charges.

Liberal Arts
A 35 year-old falls for a 19 year-old and what follows is a lot of blah and predictable, occasionally touching but ultimately nice discussion of youth, age and the way the world works. If you are a fan of Josh Radnor or Elizabeth Olsen – how could you be? She's only been around for 30 seconds – then you might think its worth the ticket price, but it won't change your life.