2017 Sundance Film Festival

The snowstorm that hit Park City might intimidate the average man but it is just another day in the crazy geographical life of Jason Isaacs. Here is an actor who has spent the last twelve months working in such locales as Australia, Tokyo, Mumbai, Cuba, New York, London and Winnipeg so 18 inches of fresh powder is hardly going to slow him down.

What did mom say? When it’s cold outside – wear a hat! This year’s Sundance attendees certainly took the advice to heart. New trend: the beret is back.

Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me By Your Name transcends the easy stereotyping of genre, achieving a truly universal story of love, desire and the complicated ways they intertwine in a poignant coming-of-age story. Guadagnino was nominated for a Golden Globe for I Am Love, a sweeping portrait of emotional angst in an Italian dynasty starring Tilda Swinton.

Nobody can bring a spark of humor and a healthy helping of down-to-earth like Salma Hayek. Whether at glitzy awards shows or glamorous film festivals, you can count on the jet setting Mexican actress to take the proceedings in stride and with the signature cheekiness which makes her hands down the dinner party guest you most want to sit next to.

A dinner party from hell? Who hasn’t been to one at least once in their lives? But nothing you may have experienced compares to what poor Beatriz (Salma Hayek) goes through when she gets stranded at the mansion of a client because her car won’t start. You see, Beatriz is a healthcare worker, a masseuse and a healer.

Matt Bomer is an actor who likes a challenge. After putting his body through drastic weight loss for his Golden Globe winning performance in The Normal Heart, the native Texan throws himself into the middle of the frozen Montana mountain country for Walking Out, a taut thriller about a father and son who try and reconnect on a rite of passage hunting trip.

It came as little surprise to those who were at the film’s Monday premiere at the Eccles that Patti Cake$ was bought by Fox Searchlight on Tuesday for a reported $10. 5 million price tag.

Debuting his much-anticipated feature The Discovery at Sundance, filmmaker Charlie McDowell may have been excused for feeling anxious, knowing he cast the festival’s creator Robert Redford in a lead role. But truth be told, he might have been under equal pressure to make sure the news reporter in the film looks good.

Things got rough in Park City this year: first the cyber attack (currently being investigated by the FBI), then a power outage that led to several screenings being cancelled, and now a major snowstorm. Sundancers are thinking twice before leaving their hotels and condos for post-sunset parties - is it worth it to face temperatures in the low 20s and walk through ice and sludge? There is, however, another beige carpet, and a rather warm one: the path leading to premieres at the Eccles.

Woody Harrelson stars as the title character, a curmudgeonly loner in a dark comedy based on a graphic novel by Daniel Clowes of Ghost World fame. If the terms graphic novel and comedy, used in the same sentence, baffle you, you are not alone.