Last Updated:January 24, 2026, 10:00 IST

Channing Tatum, Olivia Wilde and Charli xcx premiered films at Sundance Film Festival, including Josephine, I Want Your Sex and The Moment.

Channing Tatum, Olivia Wilde and Charli xcx premiere movies at Sundance Film Festival

Park City was buzzing on Friday night as Sundance turned the Eccles Theatre into a high-voltage launchpad for very different kinds of stories — from tender childhood trauma to provocative art-world drama and pop-star self-reflection. With films headlined by Channing Tatum, Olivia Wilde and Charli xcx premiering back-to-back, the festival reminded audiences why it remains a filmmaker’s playground.

The evening opened with Josephine, a deeply personal drama written and directed by Beth De Araújo. Set in San Francisco, the film follows an eight-year-old girl, played by Mason Reeves, whose sense of safety is shattered after she witnesses a sexual assault in Golden Gate Park. Tatum and Gemma Chan portray her parents, struggling to help their daughter process fear and confusion they barely understand themselves. The film is competing in the U.S. Dramatic Competition and draws from De Araújo’s own childhood experience of seeing something traumatic at the same age.

Demand for the premiere was intense, with no empty seats inside the theatre and more than 400 people left on the waitlist. When the credits rolled, the audience responded with a long standing ovation before the cast and filmmaker took the stage for a Q&A.

De Araújo shared that she discovered Reeves at a San Francisco farmer’s market, where she approached the child’s mother and explained she was casting someone to play the daughter of Tatum and Chan. Reeves, unfazed by the spotlight, said one of her favourite moments in the film involved sharing a snack with her co-star.

“I only ate the outside and fed the jelly part to him,” Reeves said.

“That is true,” Tatum added, confirming the moment.

Tatum, who watched the film for the first time with the Sundance audience, praised Reeves’ performance, asking the crowd, “how good is she?” He also admitted the screening left him emotional, saying he cried “five, six, seven times.”

The mood at the Eccles shifted sharply with the premiere of I Want Your Sex, directed by Gregg Araki. The film centres on a young college graduate in his early 20s, played by Cooper Hoffman, who lands a job assisting Erika Tracy, a provocative and powerful figure in the art world portrayed by Olivia Wilde. Araki described the character as “bold, daring and very controversial,” likening her to a mix of Robert Mapplethorpe and Madonna.

“It’s the story of their affairs and the impact it has on this kid’s life and how it kind of turns his whole world upside down,” Araki told The Associated Press. “It’s fun, it’s colorful, it’s sexy. And it’s a ride.”

Araki revealed he had been developing the project for more than a decade, during which it evolved significantly. Addressing why he flipped the gender dynamic of the intern character, he said, “After #MeToo and Harvey Weinstein, all the stuff that was going on, it was literally like, I don’t really want to see a woman getting dragged around by the hair. I don’t want to seed that kind of patriarchal dynamic, even if it’s consensual.”

The director added that the change aligned with his long-standing engagement with feminist ideas and also reflected his observations about younger generations.

“What I knew as an old person, as an old-timer, in terms of socialization, dating, sex, all of this stuff that seemed to be kind of falling away,” Araki said. “And so that kind of became a major theme of the movie.”

While Wilde’s character provokes debates about sex across generations, Araki stressed the film’s underlying message. “It was very important to me to make something sex positive,” he said. “‘I Want Your Sex’ is like the opposite of ‘Babygirl,’ which I found to be very sex negative.”

Wilde, speaking after the screening, said she wished “more people made movies” the way Araki does — bringing together a creative group to make something playful outside a corporate system.

The film also features Charli xcx in a supporting role. A longtime admirer of Araki, she was inspired by his work — her “Brat” album cover drew from the title credits of his film Smiley Face. When she heard about the project, Araki said she asked to be involved and auditioned “like everyone else.”

“The character is not her. That’s what’s so fun,” he said. “She’s American, she’s super uptight and kind of pill.”

Charli xcx shot her scenes in a single day during a brief break from her tour. Her presence at Sundance didn’t end there. Earlier in the day, the festival hosted the world premiere of her self-referential mockumentary The Moment, which opens in theatres on January 30.

Friday’s Sundance lineup also included the world premiere of William David Caballero’s mixed-media feature TheyDream, which explores a Puerto Rican family processing grief through art. Caballero and co-writer Elaine Del Valle, who have previously screened short films at the festival, marked their feature debut with the project.

“Sundance has always been about possibility for me — about artists being given space to take creative risks and tell personal stories,” Del Valle told AP. “Bringing our first feature, especially in Sundance’s final year in Utah, carries a different weight.”