Basil Tsiokos is a Senior Programmer for the Sundance Film Festival, focusing on nonfiction features. He was most recently with DOC NYC for nearly a decade, where he served as Director of Programming since 2014, and with the Nantucket Film Festival as its Film Program Director. Prior to those positions, Basil was the longtime Artistic and Executive Director of NewFest. He has been affiliated with Sundance since 2005 as a Programming Associate. Basil serves on the feature nominating committees for the International Documentary Association Awards and Cinema Eye Honors. He has written about documentaries daily since 2010 on what (not) to doc. Basil holds a Masters degree from New York University and two undergraduate degrees from Stanford University.
EVERY LITTLE THING Amid the glamour of Hollywood, Los Angeles, a woman finds herself on a transformative journey as she nurtures wounded hummingbirds, unraveling a visually captivating and magical tale of love, fragility, healing, and the delicate beauty in tiny acts of greatness.
Director: Sally Aitken
Producers: Bettina Dalton, Oli Harbottle, Anna Godas
About: Intimate vérité, archival footage, and visually innovative treatments of poetry take us on a journey through the dreamscape of legendary poet Nikki Giovanni as she reflects on her life and legacy.
About: Hidden camera footage augments this perilous, high-stakes journey as we embed with families attempting to escape oppression, ultimate revealing a world most of us have never seen.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Darek Golik
Director: Jakub Piątek
About: Young pianists take part in the legendary International Chopin Piano Competition. A unique chance of a lifetime, portrayed from backstage and set to Chopin’s music.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Iris Brosch
Director: Nicole Newnham
About: Shere Hite’s 1976 bestselling book, The Hite Report, liberated the female orgasm by revealing the most private experiences of thousands of anonymous survey respondents. Her findings rocked the American establishment and presaged current conversations about gender, sexuality, and bodily autonomy. So how did Shere Hite disappear?
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Deborah Stratman
Director: Deborah Stratman
About: Evolution and extinction from the point of view of rocks. A humid take on minerals, where sci-fi meets sci-fact. The geo-biosphere is a place of evolutionary possibility, where humans disappear but life endures.
About: Fashion revolutionary Bethann Hardison looks back on her journey as a pioneering Black model, modeling agent, and activist, shining a light on an untold chapter in the fight for racial diversity.
About: In the darkness of a smoke sauna, women share their innermost secrets and intimate experiences, washing off the shame trapped in their bodies and regaining their strength through a sense of communion.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Bobby Moser
Director: Tracy Droz Tragos
About: A hidden grassroots organization doggedly fights to expand access to abortion pills across the United States keeping hope alive during a global pandemic and the fall of Roe v Wade.
About: In 1985, 46 music icons, including Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, Cyndi Lauper, Diana Ross, and Stevie Wonder, came together for the most star-studded recording session in history. This is the untold story of the legendary global pop song “We Are the World” — which very nearly didn’t happen.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Alexander Tikhomirov
Director: Axel Danielson, Maximilien Van Aertryck
About: From the first camera to 45 billion cameras worldwide today, the visual sociologist filmmakers widen their lens to expose both humanity’s unique obsession with the camera’s image and the social consequences that lay ahead.
DAUGHTERS Four young girls prepare for a special Daddy Daughter Dance with their incarcerated fathers, as part of a unique fatherhood program in a Washington DC jail.
Directors: Angela Patton, Natalie Rae
Producers: Natalie Rae, Lisa Mazzotta, Justin Benoliel, Mindy Goldberg, Sam Bisbee, Kathryn Everett, Laura Choi Raycroft, James Cunningham
Festival Section: US Documentary Competition
More Info: Check out the Sundance website for more details, including screening info, by clicking on the film title above.
AS WE SPEAK Bronx rap artist Kemba explores the growing weaponization of rap lyrics in the United States criminal justice system and abroad — revealing how law enforcement has quietly used artistic creation as evidence in criminal cases for decades.
Director/Producer: JM Harper
Producers: Sam Widdoes, Peter Cambor, Sam Bisbee
Festival Section: US Documentary Competition
More Info: Harper makes his feature directorial debut; he previously edited 2022 Sundance title JEEN-YUHS: A KANYE TRILOGY, among other projects.
Check out the Sundance website for more details, including screening info, by clicking on the film title above.
The 40th Edition of the Sundance Film Festival will run January 19-28, in-person in Utah, with a selection of titles also available online. The announced lineup consists of 82 features, 8 episodic projects, 1 participatory experience, 8 retrospective features, and 53 shorts.
As a Senior Programmer for the Festival, I’m excited to introduce these films to audiences next month. Leading up to opening day, I’ll be highlighting each of our feature and long-form episodic docs in this space with a simple pointer post. Sundance Don’t Miss Docs begins this coming Tuesday.
The lineup has been announced for the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, taking place in-person in Utah, as well as online, January 18-28.
Today’s announcement reveals 91 projects in the US and World Cinema Documentary and Dramatic Competitions, NEXT, Premieres, Midnight, Episodic, Spotlight, Family Matinee, Special Screenings, andNew Frontier sections, and may be found here. Shortsand Collection titles will be revealed in an upcoming announcement.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Darek Golik
Director: Jakub Piątek
About: Young pianists take part in the legendary International Chopin Piano Competition. A unique chance of a lifetime, portrayed from backstage and set to Chopin’s music.
About: Spurred by a provocative family memory and a lifetime of separation from the country her mother left behind, a young filmmaker delves into her mother and grandmother’s complicated pasts and her own fractured Iranian identity.
About: Fashion revolutionary Bethann Hardison looks back on her journey as a pioneering Black model, modeling agent, and activist, shining a light on an untold chapter in the fight for racial diversity.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Timothy D Easley
Director: Thom Zimny, Oren Moverman
About: The first authorized work exploring the extraordinary life of Willie Nelson traverses the personal and career ups, downs, and in-betweens of one of the world’s most beloved musicians, by turns spiritual, dramatic, and playful.
About: Intimate vérité, archival footage, and visually innovative treatments of poetry take us on a journey through the dreamscape of legendary poet Nikki Giovanni as she reflects on her life and legacy.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Angela Gzowski
Director: Lin Alluna
About: Renowned Inuit lawyer Aaju Peter has long fought for the rights of her people. When her son suddenly dies, Aaju embarks on a journey to reclaim her language and culture after a lifetime of whitewashing and forced assimilation. But can she both change the world and mend her own wounds?
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Jeff Hutchens, courtesy of SHOWTIME
Director: Razelle Benally, Matthew Galkin
About: The deaths of a group of Native American women in rural Montana are the focus as Native families, journalists, and local law enforcement reveal a violent crisis set in motion almost 200 years ago.
About: An aspiring hospital chaplain begins a yearlong residency in spiritual care, only to discover that to successfully tend to her patients, she must look deep within herself.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Bobby Moser
Director: Tracy Droz Tragos
About: A hidden grassroots organization doggedly fights to expand access to abortion pills across the United States keeping hope alive during a global pandemic and the fall of Roe v Wade.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Iris Brosch
Director: Nicole Newnham
About: Shere Hite’s 1976 bestselling book, The Hite Report, liberated the female orgasm by revealing the most private experiences of thousands of anonymous survey respondents. Her findings rocked the American establishment and presaged current conversations about gender, sexuality, and bodily autonomy. So how did Shere Hite disappear?
About: In the darkness of a smoke sauna, women share their innermost secrets and intimate experiences, washing off the shame trapped in their bodies and regaining their strength through a sense of communion.
About: Two friends, both Indigenous fishermen, are driven to desperation by a dying sea. Their friendship begins to fracture as they take very different paths to provide for their struggling families.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov
Director: Mstyslav Chernov
About: As the Russian invasion begins, a team of Ukrainian journalists trapped in the besieged city of Mariupol struggle to continue their work documenting the war’s atrocities.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Bobby Moser
Director: Tracy Droz Tragos
About: A hidden grassroots organization doggedly fights to expand access to abortion pills across the United States keeping hope alive during a global pandemic and the fall of Roe v Wade.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Alexander Tikhomirov
Director: Axel Danielson, Maximilien Van Aertryck
About: From the first camera to 45 billion cameras worldwide today, the visual sociologist filmmakers widen their lens to expose both humanity’s unique obsession with the camera’s image and the social consequences that lay ahead.
About: Hidden camera footage augments this perilous, high-stakes journey as we embed with families attempting to escape oppression, ultimate revealing a world most of us have never seen.
About: When the Muscogee Nation suddenly begins censoring its free press, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government’s corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian country.
About: The fate of the planet’s last untouched wilderness, the deep ocean, is under threat as a secretive organization is about to allow massive extraction of seabed metals to address the world’s energy crisis.
About: After twenty-three years in exile, the filmmaker returns to Chile to document the memories of the survivors from deposed democratic leader Salvador Allende’s intimate circle.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute | Photo by Bruce Weber
Director: Bethann Hardison, Frédéric Tcheng
About: Fashion revolutionary Bethann Hardison looks back on her journey as a pioneering Black model, modeling agent, and activist, shining a light on an untold chapter in the fight for racial diversity.
what (not) to doc 