This year’s Sundance Film Festival has had a muted debut, with entertaining but not outrageous features on topics from LGBTQ family ties to a twin-death-themed dramedy grabbing the spotlight, and documentaries leaning into decidedly uncontroversial themes of music figures and celebrity biopics.
It’s a far cry from when Quentin Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs” burst onto the scene, or when adventurous fare like “The Blair Witch Project” and “Beasts of the Southern Wild” spurred filmmaking movements, and when charged movies like “Fruitvale Station” and “Get Out” demanded conversation.
Instead, writer-director Sophie Hyde’s gentle family tale “Jimpa,” starring John Lithgow as Olivia Colman’s gay father, is a moving portrait of love and acceptance, touching on trans issues in a gentle way.