Maturing but still messy, a mumblecore kid returns to South by Southwest a veteran

“The Sun Never Sets” Marks Joe Swanberg’s Return to SXSW with Mature, Intimate Drama

Filmmaker Joe Swanberg made his 10th indie premiere at SXSW with “The Sun Never Sets,” his first film to play the festival since 2017. Known for his early rapid-fire output of loose, idiosyncratic stories — often credited as progenitors of the mumblecore movement — Swanberg’s pace has slowed, giving way to a newfound maturity both personally and artistically.

Introducing “The Sun Never Sets” at its world premiere on Friday night before a sold-out crowd at the Zach Theater, Swanberg called the project “my favorite film I’ve ever made.” Shot on 35mm film in Anchorage, Alaska, the story centers on Wendy (Dakota Fanning, delivering a vibrant performance), a woman in her 30s torn between rekindling a romance with a reckless old flame (Cory Michael Smith) and staying with the settled, divorced father of two (Jake Johnson) she’s been seeing for several years.

“I guess this is what they tell you about getting older and doing this job longer,” Swanberg said in a video interview from his Chicago home just before the festival. “You get better at it and you sort of mature and all of this.”

The film represents Swanberg’s fourth collaboration with Jake Johnson, a partnership dating back to 2013’s “Drinking Buddies.” Johnson even helped finance the new project alongside his brother. After completing the third season of Netflix’s anthology series “Easy” in 2019 — for which he wrote and directed every episode — Swanberg planned to take a break. However, a divorce and the pandemic extended that pause significantly.

During this hiatus, Swanberg produced works for other filmmakers, acted in various projects, and opened a small video store in Chicago. Encouraged by Anchorage-based producer Ashleigh Snead, he turned his focus to shooting in Alaska, a scenic locale that allowed him to grow beyond the familiar couches, bars, and apartments that characterize much of his previous work (though, notably, those settings remain in surprising numbers).

“Joe’s a real filmmaker,” Johnson said in a separate interview. “And I think sometimes he doesn’t get that credit because he can make movies with nothing. This is a real adult movie. It’s about how complicated breakups are and how messy they get. And it’s in beautiful Alaska.”

From Mumblecore Roots to Mature Storytelling

Swanberg has shifted from creating talky, provocative, sometimes controversial films about post-collegiate 20-somethings to exploring the nuanced life of a 44-year-old divorced father still figuring out his place in the world.

His original SXSW-affiliated cohort—many of whom were lumped into the mumblecore label, a name few embraced but no one better devised—included Greta Gerwig, Lena Dunham, Barry Jenkins, Ti West, and others who have since moved on to mainstream success. Yet, Swanberg does not feel left behind. Instead, he sees opportunities expanding.

“It’s gone so much better than I thought it was going to go for me,” he reflected. “When I was making these really tiny, sexually explicit 71-minute movies, I was just grateful to be here. I couldn’t believe festivals were showing this work, and it was so cool that there was a space for me in this ecosystem.

“And to watch my friends go on to do these giant movies, to see Greta doing ‘Barbie’ and stuff like that, to me it just opens up the possibilities,” he continued. “Each time a friend sets some new record or moves into a new space, I’m kind of like: Oh, that just opened up for all of us now.”

Navigating Controversy and Changing Tides

Swanberg’s earlier films often included raw sex scenes, sometimes featuring himself. Long before the #MeToo reckoning of 2017, he faced accusations of being exploitative and manipulative toward female performers. His slowdown in output coincided with a cultural shift away from his explorations of sexual power dynamics.

While some might interpret this as a preemptive soft-cancellation, Swanberg rejects that notion. “Certainly in Chicago, where I’ve spent the last five years, I’m not unwelcome places,” he explained, differentiating himself from those who were “capital-C canceled.” “My work has always pushed boundaries and attracted both positive and negative attention.”

“The Sun Never Sets” contains numerous kissing scenes but stops short of more explicit content. “I won’t do it,” said Johnson about graphic scenes. “When I worked with Joe early on, I was like, ‘I love you, man, but I’m not doing this.’”

Dakota Fanning, for her part, had no reservations about working with Swanberg. He offered intimacy coordinators to both her and Smith, though neither felt they needed one.

“There was no planet where you’d ever be asked to do anything you were uncomfortable with,” Fanning said. “If there was ever a moment like, ‘I don’t want to do that,’ he’d be like, ‘Oh, then let’s not.’ There was a day when a scene was supposed to be shot in pouring rain, and we both looked at each other and he said, ‘We’re not going to do it. The scene’s cut.’ He’s just open. And I just trusted him implicitly.”

A Collaborative and Organic Filmmaking Process

Swanberg is known for a unique process where the script is essentially a detailed outline, and actors improvise their own dialogue through rehearsals. For “The Sun Never Sets,” he and Johnson created the most complete outline he’s ever used — including some dialogue exchanges — before allowing the actors to make it their own.

Fanning recalled an early Zoom meeting where Swanberg and Johnson explained the approach. “It’s still made like a real film,” she said. “Jake and Joe promised it’s not like we’re just flying by the seat of our pants: ‘You will know what to say, I promise.’ Friends who know me asked if I was nervous, and I was. But somehow, I just knew it was going to be fine. And that proved true.”

Personal Stories Woven into the Narrative

Despite its Alaskan setting, Swanberg describes “The Sun Never Sets” as “extremely personal.” “I was definitely writing a movie about a divorced mid-40s guy dating a younger person,” he said. “The questions of marriage and having children were an amalgam of two real relationships that I merged into one onscreen.”

He calls the film an exploration of “questions that I had and have about what my own relationships are going to look like post-divorce.”

This emotional depth is evident in Fanning’s layered performance, arguably one of the strongest in her lengthy career. Swanberg’s style draws both ease and intensity from her, capturing a woman grappling with pivotal choices amid emotional turmoil.

At the premiere, Fanning remarked, “I’ve never put so much of myself into a role before.”

“I think the goal of Joe’s films, and my goal with this film, is trying to make everything feel real,” she added. “Things are just a mess some of the time.”

Swanberg also appears briefly as the new husband of Johnson’s character’s ex-wife. Even the children in the film are named after Swanberg’s own kids.

With renewed maturity and emotional depth, Joe Swanberg continues creating cinema that blends diary-like intimacy with generational insight — a testament to his evolving artistry and personal growth.
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2026-03-14/joe-swanberg-sxsw-2026-sun-never-sets-interview-dakota-fanning

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