Dylan O'Brien's Twinless pulled from Sundance streaming over piracy

Today, in "This may actually be why we can't have nice things" news: Dylan O'Brien's buzzy dark comedy Twinless has been pulled from the online streaming portal for the Sundance Film Festival, due to claims of piracy from festival organizers. The movie is the second film this year to get taken off the online platform, which allows digital ticket buyers to view movies screening at the festival from the comfort of their own homes, after chunks of documentary Selena y Los Dinos was reportedly smuggled over to TikTok.

Sundance went digital during the COVID lockdowns, and then kept its online portal open even as as public spaces opened back up, selling tickets allowing online viewers to attend virtual screenings—a controversial move in some camps. Festival organizers issued a statement about the Twinless decision today, saying that "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." The Sundance statement went on to say that single-ticket buyers would get a voucher allowing them to pick another movie to screen, and that organizers "intend to fully cooperate with local, state, and federal law enforcement on all piracy-related issues."

Written, directed by, and co-starring James Sweeney, Twinless has been one of the bigger names to come out of this year's Sundance, with studios reportedly excited to sink their teeth into the movie, which stars O'Brien in a double role opposite Sweeney. (You can read A.V. Club film editor Jacob Oller's write-up of the "charming low-key film" here.) The film won the Audience Award for U.S. Dramatic Competition at this year's fest.

Films competing at Sundance are required to be part of the festival's online portal. The continuing existence of the portal—a huge boon for movie fans, but which impacts not just piracy issues, but also questions of distribution for films that are usually at the festival to try to secure buyers for theatrical or digital releases—remains a major question mark for the relationship between Sundance and the more small-scale and independent branches of the film industry.

[via Deadline]