function onPlayerReadyVidible(e){'undefined'!=typeof HPTrack&&HPTrack.Vid.Vidible_track(e)}!function(e,i){if(e.vdb_Player){if('object'==typeof commercial_video){var a='',o='m.fwsitesection='+commercial_video.site_and_category;if(a+=o,commercial_video['package']){var c='&m.fwkeyvalues=sponsorship%3D'+commercial_video['package'];a+=c}e.setAttribute('vdb_params',a)}i(e.vdb_Player)}else{var t=arguments.callee;setTimeout(function(){t(e,i)},0)}}(document.getElementById('vidible_1'),onPlayerReadyVidible); With the Sundance Film Festival wrapping up this weekend, Mudbound and A Ghost Story have become two of the 11-day galas buzziest titles. Mudbound seems like a surefire contender for next years Oscars, and A Ghost Story is a supernatural art-house feature that demands your attention. Here are a few words on both.A Ghost StoryWritten and directed by David LoweryStarring Rooney Mara and Casey AffleckAcross its 87-minute runtime, A Ghost Story is nearly wordless. One central character looks like hes wearing a Halloween costume, and the other spends most of her time grieving. Theres a lot of milling about, wispy flashbacks and a 10-minute unbroken shot of Rooney Mara binge-eating a pie. It is, in no short order, Sundances most captivating experience.Despite the premise of a horror movie, A Ghost Storyis anything but. David Lowerys stunning meditation opens with an apt Virginia Woolf quote: Whatever hour you woke, there was a door shutting. The short story from which that line derives continues thusly: From room to room they went, hand in hand, lifting here, opening there, making surea ghostly couple. Except here theres only one ghost, an unnamed Texas musician (Casey Affleck) whos just died in a car crash outside the home where he and his wife (Mara) lived.The couple had been arguing lately, suffering the same quotidian spats that plague any long-term relationship' we glimpse these exchanges in a small stretch of dialogue before the movie replaces words with Daniel Harts orchestral score. We linger on a hospital gurney where the dead man lies, covered by a white bed sheet. The camera sits... and sits... and then, as if awakened in a flash, the man pops up. But hes no longer a man, not technically. Hes a ghost, with peepholes in the sheet that mostly conceal his pupils.The ghost returns to the house, where he whiles away the days with his beloved, who is mourning (and eating entire pies in one bitter rush). Theres a comfort to the ghosts presence, yet the mood is defined by his widows loss. Dead or alive, neither knows how to move forward. Maras character, also unnamed, continues as if the phantoms of her past are stationed around every corner of the house. (They are.)Eventually, she moves out. (Wouldnt you') But the poltergeist remains, mourning a new familys arrival. From there, the scope of A Ghost Story swells, sliding ever so gently through time to raise questions about humanitys tenure on an Earth that will one day cease to exist.A Ghost Story surprises at every turn, inventing its own rules about the ways we float in and out of one anothers lives. What remains steady is Lowerys poetic direction, a fascinating follow-up to last years delicatePetes Dragon and 2013s Malick-esque Aint Them Bodies Saints. Lowery and his cinematographer, Andrew Droz Palermo, station the camera at just enough of a distance to make us curious observers, able to project interpretations onto the action before the storys thematic questions are (mostly) answered.These are fascinating roles for Mara and Affleck, the latter of whom headlines another Sundance flick on the heels of resurfaced sexual harassment allegations. But A Ghost Story isnt about its characters, not really ' its about time and the surprising, consequential roles we play on a planet that makes us feel slight. As a movie, its a risky experiment, one that may bore some impatient viewers. But embrace it, and youll realize how limitless A Ghost Story is, how beautiful and circular and impactful its meanings are. Lowery has given us something spectral. It will haunt you.MudboundWritten by Dee Rees and Virgil WilliamsDirected by Dee ReesStarring Carey Mulligan, Jason Clarke, Jason Mitchell, Garrett Hedlund, Mary J. Blige, Jonathan Banks and Rob MorganPossibly the smash of this years festival, Mudbound starts in the midst of World War II and ends after its culmination, not long before the civil rights movement would start to confront Americas racial history. The horrors of international warfare mirror a violence that is part and parcel of country life, as one plantation wife (Casey Mulligan) says in a voice-over. Tragic and confrontational, Mudbound unfolds from the perspective of two clans: white Mississippi Delta farmers and the black family employed on their desolate land.Based on Hillary Jordans novel, the movie at first chronicles standard wartime drama. A life of semi-seclusion and scarce resources gives way to domestic tension within the white tribe (Jason Clarke plays Mulligans husband, and Jonathan Banks portrays her villainously racist father-in-law), while the hard-working black familys key concern is putting food on the table and getting their son, Ronsel(a top-notch Jason Mitchell), home from combat.Ronsel survives, but the community he returns to isnt much safer. It is riddled with racial turmoil, rendering a fellow veteran (a career-best Garrett Hedlund) one of his sole allies.Turbulence on the farm and in the nearby town escalates, rainstorms threatening to drown any peace of mind. Eventually,a pack of racist white townsfolk get their hands on Ronsel, and Mudbound becomes an audacious portrait of mid-century American horrors.Mudboundmarks the third feature from Dee Rees, director of the sensational 2011 coming-of-age indie Pariah and the 2015 HBO biopic Bessie. Those offered intimate character studies, whereas Mudboundis a sprawling ensemble that indicts our countrys dirty history. Rachel Morrisons earthy cinematography distracts from the 131-minute runtime, which could use a trim to avoid tangential subplots. Rees film feels most alive in its ravaging final half hour,but it takes some time to get there. Its apparent the talented director has expanded her cinematic scope with each project, and while Mudbound retains the human poetry of Pariah, it loses its sharp focus. That doesnt make the ending any less searing. Follow the muddy journey, and, no matter the path, you will come out on the side of gross racial injustice. Told with a blend of terror and hope, this is a story we need to see.type=type=RelatedArticlesblockTitle=More Sundance coverage... + articlesList=5889fd1be4b061cf898ce30e,58881f4ce4b098c0bba78147,58867896e4b096b4a2340acd -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. 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