Sundance Film Festival 2023: 20 Movies You Need To Know About
15. Past Lives
Unquestionably the most critically acclaimed narrative feature of Sundance 2023, Past Lives stars Greta Lee and Teo Yoo as childhood friends who reunite in New York for a week, some 20 years after they were separated in South Korea.
This is an extraordinary confident and assured debut from Celine Song, who avoids the temptation for grandstanding melodrama in favour of more quiet yet no-less-heartbreaking moments of revelation.
The entire cast, especially Lee, is terrific, taking a superficially familiar story and bringing a rare sort of truth to it, in what's categorically the fest's biggest tear-jerker this year, albeit without a note of contrivance.
If people aren't talking about Past Lives this time next year as awards season wraps up once again, it'll be a damn shame.
Past Lives will release later this year.