Sundance Film Festival lineup announced

Layoffs continue to dominate the front pages and now they’ll be on the big screen as well, as John Wells will bring his anticipated economic drama “The Company Men” to January’s Sundance Film Festival.

The “ER” creator’s feature-film debut follows three men ( Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones and Kevin Costner) struggling to cope with the financial and emotional consequences of being downsized. It marks the second feature this winter, after George Clooney’s “Up in the Air,” that explicitly deals with themes of the recession and its effect on everyday people.

“Men” is part of a slate of out-of-competition films that the festival announced Thursday, a list that also will bring a splash of “Twilight” glamour when Kristen Stewart’s Joan Jett biopic “The Runaways” makes its premiere.

As Sundance seeks to remain true to its indie roots -- it’s added a category dedicated specifically to micro-budget movies and cut its ceremonial opening night premiere to make way for two competition offerings -- some of its films will be examining hits from the past. In addition to “Runaways,” the festival will be screening “Nowhere Boy,” about the early years of John Lennon and the future Beatle’s difficult Liverpool childhood.

Sundance organizers have been playing up the notion that the festival is pulling back from movies with sizable budgets and recognizable stars to return to artier, riskier fare. Still, movies featuring Katie Holmes (“The Extra Man,” as well as a possible second film) and Jonah Hill (an untitled comedy from Mark and Jay Duplass) will join Sundance stalwarts Philip Seymour Hoffman (the romantic drama “Jack Goes Boating,” which he directed) and Catherine Keener (the real-estate dramedy “Please Give”) in the premiere section.

Few indie-world film figures, however, deserve the title of Sundance stalwart more than Mark Duplass, who with his untitled comedy is bringing a movie he either starred in or directed to the festival for the third straight year (he also executive produces three other films playing in the festival, “The Freebie,” “Lovers of Hate” and “Bass Ackwards”).

Five years ago, he and Jay went to Park City with what would become a cult hit, the offbeat “The Puffy Chair.” He says that despite the bigger budget that comes with Fox Searchlight’s backing, fans will be reminded of his and his brother’s first film.

“For our first outing with Searchlight, we wanted to do something we knew we could do well,” he says. “For all practical purposes, this movie feels like one of the little movies we used to make that just happens to have famous people in it.”

Sundance typically has shied away from showing movies that have played at other festivals, particularly the Toronto International Film Festival. But this year, in a new programming category called Spotlight, the festival will be showing several acclaimed movies that premiered elsewhere, including the French prison thriller “A Prophet” (which showed in Cannes and Telluride), the metaphysical mediation “Enter the Void” (Cannes and Toronto) and the family tale “Mother & Child” (Toronto).

“It started with the premise of films we love that we just wanted to show because they are great,” festival director John Cooper says. “But these are not necessarily crowd pleasers -- ‘Enter the Void’ certainly isn’t.”

The festival is likely to add several other premieres. Those movies are likely to include Andrew Jarecki’s true-crime drama “All Good Things” and a documentary about British street artist Banksy called “Exit Through the Gift Shop.”

For a complete list of films playing Sundance, go to TheEnvelope.com.

steve.zeitchik@latimes.com

Times staff writer John Horn contributed to this report.