By Adam Silverstein
Books and films have always had a complicated love affair, but when it works, it really works. The 2026 Sundance Film Festival lineup is packed with adaptations that don’t just translate beloved stories to the screen — they reimagine them. From classic novels and contemporary memoirs to inventive short stories, these films prove that great writing is still fertile ground for bold, surprising cinema. Here are the literary adaptations that take the leap at this year’s Festival — and land somewhere thrilling, strange, and unforgettable.
Extra Geography (World Cinema Dramatic Competition) — Shakespeare? Meh. This sharply observed, dryly funny coming-of-age story set at an English girls’ boarding school follows two best friends through teenage chaos — and a school production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Directed by Molly Manners in her feature debut and adapted from a short story by Rose Tremain, Extra Geography watches an extracurricular assignment spiral into a daring experiment in love, overflowing with jealousy, confusion, and hormones. Anchored by superb performances from Marni Duggan and Galaxie Clear, it’s a bracingly honest portrait of how intense — and fragile — teenage friendships can be. Available to watch in person and online
Fing! (Family Matinee) — Adapted from a wildly popular children’s book, here’s a bonkers, candy-colored adventure with real heart. Directed by Jeffrey Walker, it centers on a girl who already has everything — until she demands a mysterious creature called Fing. There’s broad comedy, including Fing itself, a destructive, custard cream–obsessed monster, but also a gentle lesson about gratitude and empathy. Silly, suspenseful, and packed with surreal charm (including scene-stealing Taika Waititi as an eccentric animal expert), this one is for families and inner children alike. Available to watch in person
Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie (Premieres) — Alex Gibney’s harrowing documentary draws from Salman Rushdie’s memoir Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, confronting the 2022 attack that nearly took the author’s life. Told largely in Rushdie’s own words, the film is intimate, disturbing, and unflinchingly graphic, tracing the days after the stabbing and the long road to recovery. But this is more than an account of violence: It’s an essential study of a writer who has spent much of his life in hiding and who refuses to surrender joy, anger, or freedom. Available to watch in person
Living with a Visionary (Short Film Program 1) — Based on John Matthias’ poignant memoir and narrated by James Cromwell, this quietly devastating animated short explores love, aging, and loss. Under the direction of Stephen P. Neary, delicate, colorful sketch drawings depict a man caring for his wife as Parkinson’s disease blurs reality with vivid hallucinations and growing confusion. Isolated by COVID-19 and reshaped by illness, their decades-long marriage feels at once fragile and profound. Tender, imaginative, and deeply sad, it captures the cruelty of disease — and the stubborn endurance of love — in just a few unforgettable minutes. Available to watch in person and online
Mysterious Skin (Park City Legacy) — Gregg Araki’s cult classic, adapted from Scott Heim’s 1995 novel, remains one of the most unsettling films to emerge from American independent cinema. Set in small-town Kansas, it follows two boys navigating the aftermath of childhood trauma in radically different ways. Joseph Gordon-Levitt gives a fearless performance as a teenage hustler, while a young Brady Corbet plays a boy obsessed with UFOs. Dark, confrontational, and emotionally raw, the film refuses easy answers about shame, memory, and abuse. More than 20 years on, Mysterious Skin remains a tough but vital experience — and a reminder of Araki’s uncompromising vision. Available to watch in person
See You When I See You (Premieres) — Directed by Jay Duplass and based on Adam Cayton-Holland’s Tragedy Plus Time: A Tragi-Comic Memoir, this frank, darkly funny film examines grief in all its messy, complicated forms. Cooper Raiff stars as Aaron Whistler, a young comedy writer struggling with PTSD after the sudden death of his sister and best friend. Told in fragments and therapy sessions, it lays bare how loss fractures time, identity, and ambition. Featuring a piercing performance by Kaitlyn Dever, Duplass’ film brings the director’s trademark emotional honesty to a story about learning how to move on. Available to watch in person
Soul Patrol (U.S. Documentary Competition) — Shot with the scope and urgency of a narrative feature, Soul Patrol revisits a largely unacknowledged chapter of the Vietnam War. Directed by J.M. Harper and drawn from Ed Emanuel’s firsthand recollections, the documentary follows the first all-Black long-range reconnaissance patrol team as surviving members reunite decades later. Using striking archival footage, the film examines the danger they faced abroad — and the racism and neglect they encountered upon returning home. It’s a sobering account of bravery, betrayal, and survival, and a powerful reminder of how unevenly America has remembered its wars. Available to watch in person and online
Time and Water (Premieres) — In Sara Dosa’s adaptation of Andri Snær Magnason’s acclaimed book On Time and Water, a lyrical meditation on climate change, memory, and mortality follows the author as he reckons with the melting of Iceland’s glaciers alongside the fading presence of his grandparents. What emerges is a quiet time capsule for things vanishing in plain sight, weaving family archives into planetary crisis. Poetic, urgent, and unexpectedly intimate, it becomes a moving reflection on belonging in a world that is slipping, irreversibly, out of balance. Available to watch in person and online
Troublemaker (Premieres) — Drawing on Nelson Mandela’s autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, Antoine Fuqua’s film offers a sweeping, emotionally charged portrait of the struggle against apartheid. Blending archival footage with evocative animation, the documentary traces Mandela’s journey from activist to prisoner to global icon while never losing sight of the brutality faced by Black South Africans under the regime. Both a history lesson and a character study, Troublemaker captures the anger, sacrifice, and resolve that shaped a movement — and a leader the world desperately needed. Available to watch in person
Wicker (Premieres) — A husband made by hand is bound to cause trouble. Olivia Colman stars as a lonely fisherwoman whose decision to fashion a companion out of wicker — embodied by Alexander Skarsgård — unsettles her medieval village, igniting gossip, jealousy, and desire. Starring Peter Dinklage as the sly basketmaker, Eleanor Wilson and Alex Huston Fischer’s darkly whimsical film adapts Ursula Wills’ short story with surreal flair. Funny, tragic, and truly uncanny, Wicker is a strange fable about desire — and what we’re really made of. Available to watch in person
