16 Indie Films to Get Excited About This Year
Updated on January 31, 2022 at 2:49 p.m. ET.
For the second year in a row, the Sundance Film Festival had to go completely virtual, but that didn’t stop the annual celebration from giving a robust preview of the most exciting emerging artists in Hollywood. Much of this year’s slate defied the pandemic’s limitations: Twisty horror films didn’t need Park City’s frigid climate to deliver chills. Character studies that grappled with isolation came off as reassuring for the way they proved that productions could work amid COVID-era precautions. And a number of movies treated intimate subjects—including sex positivity and abortion—with such a warm, gentle touch, it felt right to be watching them away from a crowded theater. As always, some titles have already received release dates in the coming months while others are still in the process of scoring distribution deals. However long the industry takes to get these films into your streaming queues or on theater marquees, the ones below are worth the wait.
Fresh (Hulu, March 4)
Dating in the middle of a pandemic looks easy when compared with what happens in this film. Sebastian Stan gives an extravagant performance as the man of Noa’s (Daisy Edgar-Jones of ) dreams until he reveals his rather, well, unusual appetite.
