Let me preface this post by mentioning the obvious, the Sundance Film Festival occurred months ago. So, nothing below will be breaking news or even just news. However, archaic or not, I’m still sharing.

The Sundance Film Festival was scheduled to take place in person this year, but the flare of Omicron cases in the preceding weeks caused the event’s organizers to rethink their strategy at the last minute, and it again became an online-only affair. Although we watched our screenings from our private couch theater not the communal places we were expecting, the experience was still excellent. Here’s what we saw and what we thought about it.

Fire of Love is a documentary about the famous French volcanologists Maurice Krafft and Katia Krafft and their love triangle with volcanoes that eventually lead to their deaths in 1991 during an eruption on Mount Unzen in Japan. Throughout this film, the knowledge of their end looms, but the focus is less on how they died and more on how they lived. Utilizing the best of over 200 hours of footage captured by the couple themselves, this documentary is captivating and uplifting despite its underlying tragedy.

Viewers are swept up in the Kraffts’ passion, curiosity, wonder, and thirst to experience the most in life as those same drives propel them to astonishing, exquisite dangers. The Kraffts believed curiosity is stronger than fear, and when humans proved disappointing, they took solace in forces more powerful than humanity. I’d highly recommend this documentary for all those who want to be awed by the might of nature and the human heart.

On a side note, if you are wondering about the Kraffts’ legacy, the Kraffts’ pleas and documentation eventually led multiple governments to implement warning systems and take volcanic threats seriously, which saved thousands in the Philippines when Mount Pinatubo erupted in 1991.

Most of us recall the crashes of two Boeing 737 MAX planes in 2018 and 2019 just months apart, which killed all those aboard in both cases. Our second screening, Downfall: The Case Against Boeing, is a documentary directed by Robert Kennedy’s youngest daughter Rory that explores the cultural shift at Boeing toward maximizing stock prices and minimizing quality/engineering budgets that led to the demise of those two planes. Through the lens of the loved ones of victims, former Boeing employees, investigative journalist Andy Pasztor from the Washington Post, congressman Peter DeFazio, and pilots, this documentary condemns the greed that is never satisfied and values the bottom line above human life.

What caused these two planes to malfunction, and how does it relate to corporate greed? MCAS, a flight stabilization system, triggered the fall of both aircrafts. The 737 MAX was designed with extremely fuel-efficient engines, but Boeing decided to put these on an old plane body to save development costs. The MCAS was created to help with the resulting inevitable problems. However, Boeing’s own reports said pilots would only have 10 seconds to react to an MCAS malfunction or the malfunction would result in the catastrophic destruction of the plane. Despite that conclusion, Boeing didn’t want to retrain pilots on MCAS because of the expense. Therefore, they told pilots nothing of this system and hid it from the FAA. The end outcome was the loss of almost 350 lives.

Did the fault lie solely with Boeing? Evidence indicates no. After the first crash, the FAA did an investigation and determined that over the course of the life of the 737 MAX, 15 crashes should be expected given its current issues. Still, the plane was not immediately grounded by the agency. The documentary suggests this lack of action occurred because FAA employees were buttering up a potential employer as they sought industry jobs.

In 1973, a 21-year-old Korean immigrant living in San Francisco’s Chinatown named Chol Soo Lee was arrested and later convicted of a gang-related murder, which took place in a busy Chinatown street in the middle of the day, despite scant evidence of his guilt. He served 10 years in prison for this crime, four of which he was on death row, before a grassroots effort succeeded in getting him a retrial and eventually an acquittal. Free Chol Soo Lee is a documentary about his life, this injustice, and the people who secured his freedom.

In a story like this, we expect wrong to be inflicted on a hero. That Chol Soo Lee emerged from prison and saintly became a pillar of the community that fought so hard to free him. Instead, Chol Soo Lee returned as a human being. His demons, his loneliness, and the pressure to meet the expectations of others led to drug abuse and more time in jail for drug-related charges. Eventually, he joined an Asian gang and was burned horribly in an arson attempt. Although Chol Soo Lee was not a flawless figure, he is easy to sympathize with and relate to. It was refreshing to see a realistic portrayal of a complicated and troubled human being, as we are all complicated, and remember justice shouldn’t be reserved for only the most perfect among us.

In this picture, the words of Chol Soo Lee, who passed away in 2014, were voiced by Sebastian Yoon, a young Korean American who served time in the prison system for manslaughter, a reminder that the U.S. criminal justice system hasn’t been wholly transformed.

Free Chol Soo Lee had a spectacular Q&A, our favorite of the festival this year. During that Q&A, the filmmakers said they didn’t create the movie just for Asian Americans but for all those who are made to feel like foreigners, to feel like perpetual immigrants, and for anyone who feels marginalized or excluded from justice. Free Chol Soo Lee is a worthwhile watch, so it was no surprise to us that it won the Sundance Institute/Amazon Studios Producers Award for Documentary Features.

Our streak of documentaries continued with Lucy and Desi, Amy Poehler’s directing debut. This flick covers the couple’s professional and personal lives. I didn’t appreciate all the boundaries I Love Lucy disregarded in its day. For instance, the studio did not think the couple was “all American” enough initially because they both weren’t white. They also believed having a pregnant woman on TV, as Lucy was pregnant in the show’s second season, was too suggestive. Additionally, having a woman hold power in a household was considered controversial.

In their personal life, Lucy and Desi had joys and struggles like everyone else. Yet, after their very public divorce, they remained friends. Their last conversation, just before Desi passed from cancer, ended with many I love yous. While this was still a fascinating film, it was our least favorite of the documentaries we’d seen up to this point at the festival, with the first three tying for first.

TicTok, Boom., a documentary about TicTok, oscillates between fear and adoration. A portion of this documentary covers the more sinister side of the application, including censorship prompted by its Chinese origins and privacy/data collection concerns. Much of the rest of the show is almost a love story to TikTok and its capabilities. I appreciated not just seeing the shortcomings of the app but the benefits as well. However, I had a hard time sorting out exactly what message tied these viewpoints together.

In the Q&A, the moderator was giddy over talking to the influencers who had been in the film and were included in the Q&A session. These were Spencer X, the 8^th most followed person on TikTok, Feroza Aziz, and Deja Foxx. It was fun to see the star-struck clout these influencers have in some circles. In comparison, I had no idea who any of them were apart from their appearance in the movie.

TikTok, Boom. did provide a background so viewers could become more literate about the technologies they use, which the filmmaker, Shalini Kantayya, named as one of her chief reasons for undertaking this film. While I understand TikTok better now, I still have no intention of using it whether the cool kids like it or not. Honestly, TikTok just seems like a way for people to become even less focused. Can’t we pay attention to something for more than 15 seconds? Also, what’s up with the narcissism? I realize I am complaining about that on my own blog. Yup, hypocrisy. According to the data in this film, 25% of kids name influencer as their top career choice. Really? Not astronaut, scientist, or even firefighter? Clearly what our society needs is more people constantly filming their lives for others’ entertainment. Still, TikTok Boom. is a noteworthy documentary that merits a watch. It was just not our favorite of the festival.

In terms of uniqueness, our last film, I Didn’t See You There, was the winner. This documentary is all about perspective. It is not just about being disabled but is shot from the perspective of its disabled maker, Reid Davenport. Central to the movie is the contradictory nature of being gawked at but still invisible, of being looked at but not seen. Freedom of movement, so crucial to Reid, is also represented with fast motion interlaced by interruption throughout the show. The documentary is abstract and artsy. We enjoyed its atypical point of view but wished it would have given us a little more on Reid’s substance. I Didn’t See You There won the directing category of the U.S. Documentary Competition at the festival.

For a second year in a row, we only saw documentaries at the Sundance Film Festival, and we watched them from our couch. Partaking of excellent films and thought-provoking Q&As doesn’t warrant complaint though, even if the popcorn is missing. And now you’ve got the six-month-old scoop on it all! Lucky you!