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Charli XCX is making a trip to the Sundance Film Festival\u00a0in January. The pop singer-songwriter appears in three films premiering at the 2026 festival, including a mockumentary that she produced and stars in. Programmers on Wednesday unveiled a lineup of 90 feature films set for the festival\u2019s last hurrah in Park City, Utah.<\/p>\n
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<\/center> The slate includes documentaries on basketball great Brittney Griner,\u00a0Nelson Mandela, Salman Rushdie, Courtney Love and Billie Jean King. There are starry features with the likes of Natalie Portman, Jenna Ortega, Seth Rogen, Channing Tatum, Danielle Brooks, Olivia Colman, Da\u2019Vine Joy Randolph, Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd and Ethan Hawke. Olivia Wilde directs her first feature since “Don’t Worry Darling,”\u00a0in \u201cThe Invite.\u201d Judd Apatow chronicles comedian Maria Bamford\u2019s mental health journey. And Gregg Araki will be back in Park City with a restoration of his 2004 coming-of-age drama \u201cMysterious Skin\u201d and a new film as well.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a broad, eclectic and bold program,\u201d Sundance public programming director Eugene Hernandez told The Associated Press. He said the lineup for the festival’s final year in Park City \u201creally honors that well with this mixture of new, exciting voices paired with some really, really great familiar faces from Sundances past that I think will create a great alchemy for this really unique edition in Utah.\u201d<\/p>\n Ever a festival of discovery, of the 90 features culled from 4,255 submissions, 40% are from first-time directors. The programmers laugh when they hear people say things like \u201cthat\u2019s a Sundance movie,\u201d as if it\u2019s one, easily categorizable thing.<\/p>\n \u201cI look at the films in this program and say, \u2018You tell me what a Sundance film is\u2019 because they\u2019re so different,\u201d said programmer John Nein.<\/p>\n Charli XCX plays a rising pop star prepping for her first arena tour in the mockumentary \u201cThe Moment,\u201d which Hernandez said is \u201clike her version of \u2018This is Spinal Tap\u2019.\u201d She also appears in Araki\u2019s \u201cI Want Your Sex,\u201d in which Cooper Hoffman plays an intern who gets wrapped up in the world of an artist and provocateur (Wilde). And she\u2019s among the ensemble of \u201cThe Gallerist.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a sense of humor that she has about herself and her work, but also a creativity and a star quality that is apparent. I mean, she is magnetic on the screen,\u201d Hernandez said. \u201cIt\u2019s great to have someone who represents sort of a next generation of creativity embracing the world that we inhabit.\u201d<\/p>\n This year\u2019s slate includes more than a few exciting comedies in unexpected places. Cathy Yan directed and co-wrote \u201cThe Gallerist,\u201d a satirical look at the art world and attempting to sell a corpse at Art Basel Miami, with a large ensemble including Portman, Ortega, Sterling K. Brown and Zach Galifianakis. David Wain also has \u201cGail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass\u201d about a woman out to even the score after her fiance uses the \u201cfree pass,\u201d starring Zoey Deutch and Jon Hamm.<\/p>\n Programmer Kim Yutani said she thinks \u201cWicker,\u201d about a woman who asks a basket maker to weave her a husband, starring Colman and Skarsg\u00e5rd, will be a big crowd pleaser.<\/p>\n Other standouts are Jay Duplass\u2019s grief-themed \u201cSee You When I See You,\u201d with Cooper Raiff and David Duchovny, \u201cHa-Chan, Shake Your Booty!\u201d set inside Tokyo\u2019s ballroom dance scene and Wilde\u2019s \u201cThe Invite,\u201d about a crumbling marriage in which she stars alongside Rogen.<\/p>\n \u201cThey are finding comedy in some of the toughest places,\u201d Nein said.<\/p>\n In the Midnight section, there\u2019s \u201cBuddy,\u201d from \u201cToo Many Cooks\u201d creator Casper Kelly, about a girl who has to escape a kids TV show. There are some quirky, humorous documentaries too, including \u201cJoybubbles\u201d and John Wilson\u2019s \u201cThe History of Concrete.\u201d<\/p>\n Sundance has become famous for its documentary programming, many of which go on to be nominated for and win Oscars.\u00a0This year is likely to be no different.<\/p>\n \u201cAcross the board, both in the U.S. and internationally, you have a program that deals with the world where it is right now,\u201d Nein said. \u201cThese documentaries, they’re incredibly sophisticated, they\u2019re very mindful of how complex world issues are, and they bring you into that process.\u201d<\/p>\n One that might make waves is \u201cWhen A Witness Recants,\u201d in which author Ta-Nehisi Coates revisits the case of the 1983 murder of a boy in his Baltimore middle school and learns the truth. \u201cAmerican Doctor\u201d follows three professionals trying to help in Gaza. \u201cAll About the Money\u201d looks at heir-turned -communist Fergie Chambers. Daniel Roher and Charlie Tyrell take on artificial intelligence in \u201cThe AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist\u201d and \u201cSentient\u201d is about animal testing.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of them are sort of optimistic in one sense, in that they\u2019re about people power,\u201d Nein said. \u201cIt\u2019s about the power of community to affect change, the power of one person who you haven\u2019t heard of necessarily.\u201d<\/p>\n Those include \u201cJane Elliott Against the World,\u201d about an Iowa schoolteacher who taught anti-discrimination in 1968, and \u201cSeized,\u201d about the police raid on the Marion County Record\u00a0in Kansas.<\/p>\n New talents often emerge from Sundance, like Eva Victor\u00a0last year with “Sorry, Baby.”\u00a0This year programmers noted several gems in the lineup, including Beth de Ara\u00fajo\u2019s \u201cJosephine,\u201d about an 8-year-old who witnesses a crime, with Tatum and Gemma Chan.<\/p>\n TV veteran Molly Manners\u2019 \u201cExtra Geography,\u201d about boarding school friends in England, is one that Nein said is one of the funniest, most sophisticated debut features that he\u2019s seen from the U.K. in years.<\/p>\n He also spotlighted \u201cLADY,\u201d a first feature from Nigerian filmmaker Olive Nwosu about a cab driver in Lagos, as well as the queer genre film \u201cLeviticus.\u201d<\/p>\n As in years past, the Sundance competition titles will also be available to watch online. Yutani said her go-to recommendation for the remote audience is the world dramatic competition title \u201cLevitating,\u201d from Indonesian director Wregas Bhanuteja.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s set in this community where there\u2019s these trance parties,\u201d Yutani said. \u201cIt is a thrilling film.\u201d<\/p>\n This year\u2019s festival will also honor its late founder Robert Redford with legacy screenings and serve as a celebration of its 40+ years in Park City before it relocates to Boulder, Colorado in 2027.<\/p>\n The 2026 festival kicks off on Jan. 22 and runs through Feb. 1.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source spectrumlocalnews.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Charli XCX is making a trip to the Sundance Film Festival\u00a0in January. The pop singer-songwriter appears in three films premiering at the 2026 festival, including a mockumentary that she produced and stars in. Programmers on Wednesday unveiled a lineup of 90 feature films set for the festival\u2019s last hurrah in Park City, Utah. What You […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2193792,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[22793,22800,22811,22804,21741,105894,21737],"class_list":["post-2193791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-all-markets-rank-everywhere","tag-app-for-your-consideration","tag-app-top-stories","tag-associated-press","tag-entertainment","tag-nnt","tag-top-stories"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Sundance-2026-lineup-unveiled-Charli-XCX-Olivia-Wilde.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2193791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2193791"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2193791\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2193793,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2193791\/revisions\/2193793"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2193792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2193791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2193791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2193791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/div>\nThree Charli XCX movies<\/h4>\n
Some great comedies<\/h4>\n
Timely documentaries at Sundance<\/h4>\n
Ones to watch at Sundance 2026<\/h4>\n