Sundance Festival Films Arrive in October
Twelve films that premiered at the 2025 and 2026 Sundance Film Festivals are scheduled to arrive in theaters and on streaming platforms between now and Halloween, according to Sundance.org.
The monthly release calendar features a mix of narrative features and documentaries. Among the highlights is "Wicker," starring Olivia Colman, which premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. The narrative film follows Colman as she marries a man made of wicker.
Other narrative films include a story about a teenager drifting through a restless New Zealand summer, a portrait of comedian Maria Bamford, and a film featuring John Turturro as an old-school pickpocket in New York City.
Documentaries Covering History and Justice
Nine of the month’s films are documentaries focusing on individuals who refuse to give up. These include climbers attempting K2’s first winter summit, a grieving father searching for his missing son, a young Syrian refugee coming of age over a decade, and a son completing his documentarian father’s recordings of Harlem Renaissance icons.
Other films in the lineup revisit unfinished history to search for justice. These titles cover Kenya’s colonial-era land seizures, Leonard Peltier’s contested conviction, and the unsolved 1985 killing of Palestinian American activist Alex Odeh.
The lineup also includes the story behind a devoted producer on Wu-Tang Clan’s album.
Specific Release Dates and Titles
A remastered 4K restoration of "Donnie Darko" is back on the big screen October 2. The release honors the 2001 Sundance Film Festival cult classic’s 25th anniversary.
"The Last First: Winter K2," which premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, streams on Apple TV October 2. The documentary follows three expeditions, including one led by Nirmal "Nims" Purja, to summit K2 in winter. It uses footage shot by climbers and interviews with survivors.
"Big Girls Don’t Cry," directed by Paloma Schneideman, premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival and comes to select theaters October 9. The film stars Ani Palmer as a 14-year-old in a New Zealand beach town in the summer of 2006, alongside Beatrix Rain Wolfe and Noah Taylor.
"Kikuyu Land," co-directed by Bea Wangondu and Andrew H. Brown, is a 2026 Festival documentary about Kenya’s Kikuyu people pursuing historical land injustice claims. The film follows families digging into their past while weaving together archival footage and community testimony to shed light on Kenyan history.
"Free Leonard Peltier" revisits the 1975 shootout on South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation that led to the American Indian Movement activist’s imprisonment.