Movies streaming on the Sundance Film Festival’s online viewing platform are dropping like flies thanks to piracy: “Twinless” is now the second film to get yanked from the platform amid copyright infringements. Sundance pulled the bromance comedy, written and directed by star James Sweeney and co-starring Dylan O’Brien, on Friday evening, sparking online outrage from festivalgoers hoping to see the Audience Award winner at home.
Earlier on Friday, the Selena Quintanilla documentary “Selena y Los Dinos” was also taken down due to piracy. IndieWire understands that fans were sharing pirated clips on social media. Similarly, “Twinless” clips featuring a sex scene with Dylan O’Brien, as well as major spoilers for the movie’s twisty plot, were leaked online.
“I woke up this morning with an email thread about people posting spoilers with photos. If anyone’s seen the film, you know what I’m talking about. So I guess the audience really does like the film,” Sweeney said upon accepting the Audience Award during Friday’s ceremony at the Ray Theatre.
The Sundance Film Festival shared the following statement to IndieWire:
“The film ‘Twinless’ was a victim of some copyright infringement on various social media platforms, therefore the Festival in partnership with the filmmakers have made the decision to remove the film from the Sundance Film Festival online platform. We regret that online ticket holders will no longer be able to access the film.
“For any single ticket holder who has not yet viewed the film, your account will reflect a voucher so you may select another film to screen. We intend to keep the Sundance Film Festival platform fully available for all remaining films. We acknowledge and regret the disappointment this may cause. However, part of our commitment to advocating for independent filmmakers is ensuring that they can protect the art that they have created — now and in the future.
“We take copyright infringement extremely seriously and intend to fully cooperate with local, state, and federal law enforcement on all piracy-related issues.”
No film, whether streaming at home or playing in theaters, is immune to piracy these days, especially as fans rally around projects to share their favorite clips. On social media during the November release of “Wicked” last year, viewers were uploading entire scenes or screenshots to X or other platforms and doubling down when criticized.
Sundance pivoted to include an online platform that became the entire festival during the COVID editions in January 2021 and 2022. Since then, the festival has annually included an online selection of all the competition films across documentary and narratives, and the NEXT section, along with select Premieres titles. (“Train Dreams,” which Netflix bought out of the festival, is currently streaming.)
In the five years since Sundance made the lineup available online to ticket-holders, no other film has been pulled from the platform due to piracy concerns.
With two films now stricken from the platform, what will that mean for next year’s online platform? Will filmmakers be too wary of leaks to submit their films to these sections, or will Sundance limit which films it puts on the platform? The festival will have to react next year.
What the users ruining things for everybody don’t understand is that piracy doesn’t just hurt these movies during their festival debut; it also hurts theaters, as Sundance filmmakers rely on word-of-mouth buzz generated both on the ground in Utah and online to help secure distribution. The Sundance online platform has allowed for a more democratic festival experience (feature film tickets cost $35) when stacked against its peer events, which are reverent to theaters only and in less accessible locations.
The festival did not immediately respond to requests for comment. IndieWire has also reached out to the filmmaking team.
