Emilia Clarke kicks off Sundance as film fest returns to mountain

Park City, United States: "Game of Thrones" star Emilia Clarke kicked off the first in-person Sundance festival in three years, as indie filmmakers and Hollywood stars pulled on their snow boots and headed back to the mountains of Utah.

Co-founded by Robert Redford, Sundance has launched countless independent movies, but its absence has been keenly felt at its wintry, high-altitude base in Park City as recent editions were forced online by Covid.

"This is my first ever Sundance. So I am over the moon that everyone is filled with the same amount of excitement as I am," said Clarke, whose "The Pod Generation" film premiere headlined Thursday´s opening night.

"It´s really important as well for independent cinema. We need to keep it alive," she said.

"There are so many aspects of this film that ask so many fundamental questions that I think many of us will be wrestling with, especially now," said Clarke.

"I think it´s timely, important and beautiful."

While Sundance skews to low-budget films, Clarke is one of dozens of Hollywood stars who will make the trek to Park City for high-wattage premieres.

Also Thursday, "Star Wars" alumnus Daisy Ridley unveiled "Sometimes I Think About Dying," a low-key indie drama in which she plays a deeply shy office worker whose quiet life is punctured by the arrival of a new, charismatic colleague.

On Friday, Jonathan Majors will unveil a much-hyped performance in "Magazine Dreams," set in the dangerously competitive world of amateur bodybuilding.

At the weekend, Anne Hathaway stars in "Eileen," about a young secretary working at a prison who befriends a glamorous counselor with a dark secret.

Emilia Jones also returns to the festival that first played her best picture Oscar winner "CODA," with "Cat Person," adapted from a New Yorker short story, and "Fairyland," based on a best-selling memoir about San Francisco´s AIDS crisis. (AFP)