At the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, Filmmaker magazine asked a series of directors to talk about the films they were excited about at this year’s event. Here Jonas Carpignano, writer/director of the forthcoming feature A Chjàna, offers his recommendations.

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, Jan. 26, 3:30pm -- Eccles Theatre, Park City] What I had to sacrifice to make Muscle Shoal was being there for my children. I am a single father of two awesome boys. They need me and I need them. They are my most precious blessing and they make my life rich. They miss me when I’m gone and I miss them. Gone for them isn’t just me being away on a shoot, it’s being at the office late at night trying to make a deadline or trying to press ahead hard when the inspiration is flowing. It’s having to …

“Sundance is our annual tradeshow,” a friend remarked to me at one of the very crowded parties this year. Indeed, it is a place to catch up, even if that short conversation is in line at a theater or at Starbucks instead of the kind of proper sit-down you’d have at Cannes or Berlin. Here are a few of the folks I bumped into at Sundance, beginning with, above, director Jehane Noujain, snapped on Heber Street just hours before the premiere of her latest documentary, The Square. I was knocked out by the film, which is a vivid and expertly …

I’m looking out my window right now and I don’t see mountains or snow. Miraculously, after 12 hours of traveling and functioning on about 15 hours of sleep over the last five days, I’m back in New York. Between packing up all my sweaters and saying goodbye to friends, I was still able to have a productive last day at Sundance though. I photographed a brunch the IFP and Sundance Institute hosted for film festival organizers, saw The Spectacular Now and Shane Carruth’s incredible Upstream Color, and made it up to Main Street only to be denied that free latte I …

[PREMIERE SCREENING: Thursday, Jan. 24, 9:45pm -- Eccles Theatre, Park City] It all depends on who you ask. The producers would probably say they sacrificed an ungodly amount of money. Which is true. Good on them. The actors might say they sacrificed a larger paycheck on a bigger movie. To be sure. It’s an indie. The narcissist, which by definition every filmmaker qualifies, says EVERYTHING: grooming, pond-gazing, moonlight sonatas, vengeance against enemies, meditative bowel movements, a drastic reduction in sexual activity (if not a total loss), etc. But we’re twins. So we sacrificed each other. You see, we share everything. …

Tonight the winners of the short film awards for the Sundance Film Festival were announced. The Grand Jury Prize went to Polish director Grzegorz Zariczny’s The Whistle, while two directors known for their feature-length work — Damien Chazelle and Michael Almereyda — also picked up awards. The full list of winners is below: The Short Film Grand Jury Prize was awarded to: The Whistle / Poland (Director: Grzegorz Zariczny) — Marcin, a lowest-leagues football referee who lives in a small town near Krakow, dreams of better times. At his mother’s urging, he decides to change his life and find himself a girlfriend and a better job. …