5 Things You Need To Know About Sundance 2015

Sundance Film Festival kicks off tomorrow in Utah, and along with the usual raft of super indie cinematic showings, it's also the stomping ground for Hollywood stars looking to revell in some non-LA coldness, wear cosy, non revealing clothes and watch some movies which are seriously worthy. Here are five things you need to know about the festival in 2015.

1. There be famous people, usually with beards and puffa jackets

Airport security in Salt Lake City must be super tight, because every man attending will at some point lose their razor in favour of a full-blown beard (we're looking at you Jon Hamm). One of the hotly tipped premieres is I Am Michael, starring James Franco and Emma Roberts in the story of a gay activist who is 'saved' from his sexuality when he finds god. Whilst he's clean shaven for the film, Franco, who stars in two of the programme's leading listings, will no doubt attend in possession of a face covering of some sort.

2. The festival's Seventies heritage is sooo 2015

It was founded in 1978 as Utah Film Festival (changing to Sundance in 1984), and in its current form features trips to ski lodges in trippily named resorts, frequent sightings of Robert Redford (he is the chairman of the festival, and this year is showing A Walk Into The Woods) and we're imagining that someone will wear a fringed brown suede jacket at some point (possibly underneath a Canada Goose). The perfect place for flarespiration (we hope).

3. Greta Gerwig is Mistress America

Which, if you google it, throws up a lot of weird results. But just think of the interpretive dancing she has gifted us in the last couple of years: down the street in indie flick Frances Ha; with Arcade Fire at the YouTube Music Awards; doing The Sambola in Damsels in Distress. Now, she's starring in a lost-in-the-city New York dramedy about dream-chasing and cat-stealing from her FH director Noah Baumbach. Expect low-fi laughs.

4. The festival finally gets a Kurt Cobain biopic

We're big greebos at heart, so revisiting the fleeting life of our teen rock crush is a definite must. It's now 17 years since documentary maker Nick Broomfield wrangled with Courtney Love (and lost) when she threatened to sue the festival over his film Kurt & Courtney. Now, two decades on, they'll be showing a film which Love loves - Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck - by legendary sports documentarian Brett Morgen. It's full of raw emotion and 90s grunge wear, not to mention Cobain with some on-trend mauve hair, which we are definitely lusting over.

5. All of these films are now on our radar

Gambling drama Mississippi Grind, starring the very quiet of late Ryan Reynolds as a poker chancer; Experimenter about a Sixties academic (the always intense Peter Sarsgaard) who made his test subjects undergo a series of Obedience Experiments, like a large-scale Christian Grey; Z for Zachariah directed by the critically acclaimed Craig Zobel (Compliance), about a post-apocalyptic world where the only three people left alive are Margot Robbie, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Chris Pine (which doesn't sound too bad to us). Hopefully a few of these will even get a trailer in the wake of their first showings...