I remember remarking at my first Sundance: "this year's Sundance is so amazing" and the person I was with said "it's like this every year"--and they were right.
Thanks be to Sundance...another year--this is my fifth time to attend, the first being in 2013 when Ryan Coogler's Fruitvale was the standout film--and as always it blows me out of the water.
Today I watched A Little Prayer (Angus MacLachlan) starring Jane Levy, who delivers an Oscar-worthy performance, and David Strathairn. I also experienced the poetic and experimental film about rocks entitled Last Things by director Deborah Stratman at The Egyptian Theater.
Director Deborah Stratman takes a picture of the audience at The Egyptian Theater
Victim/Suspect (Schwartzman, 2023)
But today's film that will stay with me for a long time is Netflix's Victim/Suspect by director Nancy Schwartzman. This documentary exposes systemic bias against victims of sexual assault in the United States who are not only disbelieved when they report their stories at local police precincts but are in turn accused of filing false reports which results in punishments including their imprisonment.
The story centers around the investigative reporting of Rae de Leon (who works at the Center for Investigative Reporting) whose inquiry into one case leads to encountering over 200 cases nationally in which the victim becomes the suspect due to unfair police interview tactics and structural discrimination. In terms of presentation, a kind of love letter to the power of journalism, the doc itself feels like an investigation in the style of the reporters the director deeply admires while highlighting the brave women who are featured in the film and who were in attendance.
Victim/Suspect post-screening Q&A
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