RJ movie critic chats with Sundance programmers before heading to the film festival

There’s no “Frank & Lola,” the made-in-Vegas success story starring Michael Shannon, playing this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Nor is there an “Outlaws and Angels,” the grim, violent Western written and directed by Vegas native JT Mollner of Freakling Bros. haunted house fame, which played there, too.

But there will be a Las Vegas presence at this year’s Sundance.

Me.

I’ll be writing daily columns throughout the festival, which runs Thursday through Jan. 29. So to preview it, I spoke with Trevor Groth and Mike Plante, former programmers at the late, great CineVegas who are now, respectively, Sundance’s director of programming and senior programmer in charge of short films.

The two helped pare down 13,782 submissions to the 120 features and 60-plus shorts that will be presented during the Park City, Utah-based fest. Plante says he watched about 1,600 short films and another 200 features, while Groth saw about 500 features. Most of that was done from June to November.

A team of programmers tracks films throughout the year, Groth says, so he’s aware of many of the movies before he screens them. “But there’s also plenty that come in cold, as it were, kind of cold submissions, and we give sort of equal weight and attention to both. You don’t want to have any kind of favoritism in there. It would weaken the program. For us, it’s great to discover films out of the blue and discover new voices.”

“First off, we’re trying to find the best films we can,” Plante adds. “And sometimes those films are raw in some way, but show a talent that we want to support. Honestly, something may look very basic and not be shot that well, but the writing, the acting is so stellar (it’s) like, ‘OK, this is something we want to support.’ ”

The short film that’s getting the most attention this year is Kristen Stewart’s writing and directing debut, the 18-minute-long “Come Swim.” “It’s actually very well made,” Plante says. “And it has ideas, and it has a real cinematic quality to its story and its style.”

He and Groth insist “Come Swim” would have been selected even if it were written and directed by Jane Doe. Star power certainly helps with a film’s financing and distribution, Groth says. “But from a festival’s perspective, it really doesn’t at all. We base a film on its own individual merits, on how we think it plays and what kind of talent it showcases, whether it’s known or not. We love to discover new talent, and we love to showcase the best work of established talent.”

They both say you’d be surprised by the films involving big names that didn’t make the cut.

As for the ones that did, Groth tabs “The Big Sick,” “Mudbound” and “Wind River” as “films that I think will make a big splash with audiences.”

Produced by Judd Apatow, “The Big Sick” is based on the real relationship between Pakistan-born comedian Kumail Nanjiani and grad student Emily V. Gordon. In addition to dealing with the complications imposed by his traditional Muslim parents, Kumail must help Emily (portrayed by Zoe Kazan), through a medical crisis while managing her parents (Holly Hunter, Ray Romano).

“He’s great on ‘Silicon Valley,’ ” Groth says of Nanjiani, “but to see him in this lead role, telling a personal story — he wrote it with his wife — it works on so many levels. It’s funny, it’s a love story and, culturally, it’s very timely, too. It’s about a Pakistani-American experience. I think all of those layers are really going to elevate it.”

“Mudbound” stars Garrett Hedlund, Carey Mulligan, Jonathan Banks, Mary J. Blige and Jason Clarke in a multiracial story of two families struggling to make it in the post-World War II South. “It’s a really incredible accomplishment,” Groth says. “It’s a beautiful period piece, but also, again, feels very urgent in the issues that it’s getting into.”

“Wind River,” meanwhile, focuses on an FBI agent who teams with a game tracker to investigate a murder on a Native American reservation. Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Olsen and Jon Bernthal star in the latest from Taylor Sheridan, who wrote “Sicario” and “Hell or High Water” and is making his directorial debut. “This is not directly connected” to Sheridan’s previous films, Groth says, “but the third of his sort of conceptual trilogy that he’s written about the American frontier.”

As for that aforementioned star power, this year’s schedule includes movies featuring Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, Salma Hayek, Woody Harrelson, Claire Danes, Keanu Reeves, Jon Hamm, Kevin Spacey, Peter Dinklage, Michelle Pfeiffer, Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Segel, Jack Black, Jason Sudeikis, Sundance Institute founder Robert Redford and Casey Affleck, whose sure-to-be-Oscar-nominated “Manchester by the Sea” played last year’s festival.

Even though their work at Sundance is a year-round job — Groth and Plante will start working on the 2018 edition in February — they still have time to keep alive the spirit of CineVegas, which they programmed for eight years until its demise in 2009. For the past two years, the duo have helped the Las Vegas Film Festival land certain films under the banner “CineVegas Presents.” It’s a partnership they plan to continue.

“We just recommend stuff,” Plante says. “It’s in June, so it’s good for us because we’re not super busy. And we’re recommending them films that have already played at Sundance and other fests but would never come to Las Vegas if they didn’t bring it in.”

Between Las Vegas Film Festival programmer West Lee McDowell and executive director Milo Kostelecky, Plante says, “this was the first time we felt, like, ‘Oh, somebody has the same spirit we do.’ They’re just so easy to work with. It’s the right combination of, they’re from Vegas, they appreciate what Vegas has to offer and what Vegas needs in terms of culture. … Just to have that vibe of bringing cool things and weird things to Vegas and knowing what the town needs. And then putting it downtown with everything that’s going on there, I mean, we just love it so much.”

Contact Christopher Lawrence at clawrence@reviewjournal.com. On Twitter: @life_onthecouch.