FEB 6, 2025 | FEATURES | By Jess Duran
Growing up in Utah, every winter I would look forward to the Sundance Film Festival happening just a few hours away from me in Park City. I would never actually watch any movies, that was too expensive, and tickets were too hard to get a hold of anyway. Regardless, my sister and I would walk up and down Main Street for hours, sneaking into parties and events that we weren’t invited to and enjoying the overall energy of the festival.
This year was special. This year, thanks to Colorado College’s Film and Media Studies department and an anonymous donor, I was able to fully attend the festival — screenings and all, along with every other film major in their senior year at CC. It’s something the department does every year, as a way of assuring seniors that the world of independent film is alive and well.
I saw a total of 26 films throughout the festival: a mix of documentaries, fiction films, international dramas and even a handful of short films. Despite filling my days with screening after screening, there were still so many more films that I wanted to see.
But, there is one film that stood out for me amongst them all, and it’s the movie that kicked off the festival for me.
“The Legend of Ochi” caught my eye during ticket selection as Willem Dafoe was featured in the main cast. I was not following my film major instincts, but, rather, my fan girl hormones. The more I looked into the film, the more excited I became.
The film was screened under the “Family Matinee” section of the festival, the only one in the category. I have never been too old to watch a kid’s movie, and I hope I never am. On Jan. 15, at 10:00 a.m. MST, tickets for screenings went on sale. Dodging website crashes and errors, I successfully maneuvered tickets to the “The Legend of Ochi” premiere screening from the Sundance website.
I arrived 45 minutes early, hearing horror stories of long lines and missed showings from students’ past. The ushers began letting us into the theatre some 10 minutes before the listed start time. It was then that I developed an anxiety-induced stomach ache, nervous about who I might bump into and for what seat I may get.
But the 250-seat theatre was forgiving. I found a spot in the third row from the front, which was not my usual choice, but I didn’t want to leave any opportunity, even to turn my head away from the screen. Waiting on my seat and every other seat in the theatre was a pair of A24-branded Ochi Teeth, fashioned like a pair of toy vampire teeth but resembling the creatures starring in the movie.
Before the movie began, a programmer for the festival spoke to the crowd about why he thought this film was Sundance-worthy. “Watching this movie in an empty theatre by myself,” he said, “I became excited for the opportunity to one day watch it with my six-year-old son.”
Next, he introduced the director of the film, Isaiah Saxon. This is Saxon’s first feature film and his Sundance debut. Saxon’s introduction to the film was the exact moment that I knew I was going to love this movie. “I have been working on this film since I was 12,” he said. He explained how his late father introduced him to the magic of filmmaking by taking him to a screening of “2001: A Space Odyssey” when he was younger.
This sentiment stuck with me throughout my screening. How wonderful to think that the art you create now is tied to emotions and thoughts you had when you were a child. This movie is full of the sort of wonder that only a child has.
With a 95-minute runtime, “The Legend of Ochi,” was one of the best viewing experiences I’ve had in a while. The Ochi are primate-esque creatures with bright orange fur and blue faces who populate the forests of a fictionalized European island. Their species is hunted by a group of young boys led by the character Maxim (played by Willem Dafoe). Maxim’s daughter Yuri (played by Helena Zengel) feels left out of the group. Her mother is out of the picture, and it seems as though Maxim might have preferred a son. One day, while cleaning the traps her father set up in the surrounding woods, Yuri comes across an abandoned baby Ochi. She decides to embark on a journey to reunite it with its family.
The film looks like a pop-up storybook made three-dimensional. Long, sweeping shots set up a grand landscape. Colors in this world are incredibly vibrant, and water seems to have a dreamlike quality, moving as if it were a cartoon. It’s a world where the most unlikely characters can accomplish great feats. The design of the Ochi themselves is magically familiar; whenever one was on screen, I felt something inside of me that resembled the warmth I experienced when looking at my cat.
I may be more easily moved than most, but this is a movie that had me wiping tears away. The story is packed with big feelings about family, both lost and found, in a perfectly satisfying and digestible way.
I was lucky enough to talk to director Isaiah Saxon after the screening. His excitement was palpable; I had to wait in a long line of fellow congratulators before I got my chance to speak with him. I told him how moved I was, but I also asked why he felt drawn towards children’s movies as opposed to ones more geared towards his peers.
“I think adults have lost hope,” he told me (and later apologized for being too harsh). Saxon explained that his efforts felt more likely to be received by a generation that was yet to be hardened and ready to be filled with wonder.
Movies for children may be one of my favorite genres for this reason. They carry hope with them that other films don’t, teaching valuable life lessons along the way and almostalways making me cry. It’s a genre that doesn’t get enough care directed towards it. It’s hard to think of children’s movies from recent years that are glowing stars in the cinema firmament quite like the “Shreks” and “Ratatouilles” of our generation. But I’m quite certain that “The Legend of Ochi” will make its way there.