‘Whiplash’ tops Sundance Film Festival all-time poll; Quentin Tarantino, Richard Linklater films also feature

By Ben Dalton2024-01-16T16:50:00+00:00

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sundance poll

Source: Sundance Film Festival

‘Whiplash’, ‘Reservoir Dogs’

Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash has topped a poll of over 500 film industry representatives selecting their top 10 feature films to have premiered at Sundance Film Festival.

The festival commissioned the poll to commemorate its first four decades of filmmaking, ahead of the festival’s 40^th edition, running from January 18-28 in Utah, US.

Scroll down for the all-time Sundance top 10

Filmmakers, critics and industry representatives contributed to the poll, selecting from almost 4,000 feature films to have played at the festival since its first year in 1985.

Chazelle’s second feature Whiplash caused an immediate buzz at the 2014 festival, winning the audience award and grand jury prize in the US Dramatic section. It went on to receive five Bafta nominations, winning three; before repeating those figures at the Oscars, including the best supporting actor award for JK Simmons.

It pipped Quentin Tarantino’s debut feature Reservoir Dogs to top spot. Tarantino’s crime drama played at Sundance in 1992.

Other directors featured on the list include Christopher Nolan with Memento, winner of the Waldo Salt Screenwriting award in 2001; and Richard Linklater, who has two films selected – 1995’s Before Sunrise in seventh place, and 2014’s Boyhood in eighth spot.

Only one of the films is co-directed by a woman – 2006’s Little Miss Sunshine, co-directed by Valerie Faris with Jonathan Dayton, and in at number four.

The majority of this year’s Sundance line-up was announced in December, with titles including Rose Glass’ Love Lies Bleeding and Nora Fingsheidt’s The Outrun. Guests at the festival will include Nolan, recipient of the Sundance Institute Trailblazer Award; and Love Lies Bleeding star Kristen Stewart, director of the Sundance Visionary Award.