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Sundance
Film Festival
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The Believer wins Sundance Grand Jury Prize
Day
Seven: Raw Deal Upholds Fest's Creative Perspective (Thursday,
January 25) The disturbingly controversial and emotional documentary Raw Deal: A Question of Consent, about the rape of stripper at a fraternity initiation party, is perhaps the toughest and yet most important film to see here as the festival slides toward the finish line with no breakaway movie or mega-bidding war relieving the week's ennui. Festival Founder Robert Redford (who is away shooting a film in Europe) has finally weighed in with his annual admonishment to remember what the festival is meant to be (a haven for emerging, fresh work from creative artists and not a market) while Festival Co-Director Geoffery Gilmore continues giving hopeful interviews about the selling 'picking up', leading to the conclusion that festival intent and festival reality are indeed two different things.
Day Six: Sold Out Show for Invisible Circus (Wednesday Jan 24)
Day Five: Where did Ryan Gosling Go? (Tuesday, Jan 23)
Day Four: Angry Inch Next Cult Film (Monday, Jan 22)
Day Three: Un-Happy Campers and Double Whammy (Sunday, Jan 21)
Day Two: The Bombed and Stand-Out Films (Saturday, Jan 20) The cream may rise to the top in most cases, but it was sour milk on the screens at Sundance this morning. With but one or two exceptions, the day's early screenings were loudly and roundly bemoaned as the worst of the fest starting with The Sleepy Time Gal and quickly moving to Caveman's Valentine, Some Body, Margarita Happy Hour and a split decision on Business of Strangers which had some walk out among the crowd.
Day One: Film and Digital Buzz (Friday, Jan 19) Snow flurries hit late in the afternoon as the first full day of Sundance took off with a shot. The big premieres got their hoped for attendance records as scores of industry jammed the screenings of The Business of Strangers and Trembling Before G-D (where rumor has it three deals hit the table by the time the lights went up at the end of the screening), but the smaller profile, foreign films resonated as well with audiences who had arrived at the festival unsure what to expect.
Opening Night (Thursday, Jan 18) A crowded Park City kicked off the Opening Night of the 2001 Sundance Film Festival tonight, and although the film - My First Mister by Christine Lahti - was un-spooling forty miles away in Salt Lake City, the hyped crowds were starting the party early in this mountain town. Restaurants were jammed, and the nightclubs thundered as filmmakers, dealmakers and revelers started the Main Street prowl. The street side bulletin boards only have one layer of film posters up as yet, and the rental SUV's may outnumber pedestrians (even though what snow is here is old and thin), but the celebrities have begun to arrive (Billy Baldwin, Michael Douglas, Danny Aielo to name a few).
Still
on the Road to Sundance (January 17, 2001) When the Sundance Film Festival begins on January 18, the quaint ski resort of Park City, Utah will again be inundated by hordes of Hollywood insiders, New York indie moguls and thousands of filmmaker wannabes. Like a biblical plague of show biz locusts, they will crowd the streets, the restaurants, the bars with their black-on-black ensembles, their chirping cel phones, their portable DVD players and a nervous energy whose force could threaten avalanches on the surrounding mountains. This year's films, drawn from a mind boggling 3,000 submissions, are generally unknown qualities. Expectations of uncovering jewels that will ignite audience and critics alike have been greatly lowered. It is well known industry fodder that many of the films in recent years that won top awards were major busts at the box office.
On the Road to Sundance (January 10, 2001) One week and counting…..the 2001 edition of the Sundance Film Festival begins next week as the official kick-off to the film season, and one can feel the tension mounting as filmmakers, sales agents, distributors and PR agencies work against the clock to get their media campaigns ready for the big unveiling. Filmmakers are still scrambling at this late date to assemble their sales and promotion teams. Film laboratories are dealing with rush orders and last minute crises to deliver a literally wet film print for a world premiere showing. Distributors are using their most persuasive charms to try and preview the films on video before even getting on the airplane.
General Presentation Sundance may lack the sunshine and glitter of its European counterparts like Cannes and Venice, but it compensates with innovation and energy. What other festival could convince film buffs and Hollywood executives to bundle in the snow awaiting the screening of an indie film by an unknown director? Or claim to have launched the phenomena known as Blair Witch? Founded by Robert Redford and begun as a celebration of indie filmmaking, the festival is now a must-stop-trek on the American festival circuit and considered the most prestigious competition in North America.
Pre-fest News Stars
Head to Sundance (January 15, 2001)
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The
stars are heading to Sundance ... and we don't mean the celestial
ones. The Los Angeles Times reported today that the Park
City festival is expecting an all-star guest list, including Julia
Roberts, Elizabeth Hurley, Mick Jagger, Patrick Swayze, and Forest
Whitaker. Roberts will be in town to support her niece, whose short
film was accepted into the festival. In case you've been stuck in
a snowstorm, Sundance kicks off January 18 and runs through January
28. More than 23,000 people are expected to attend. 
Sundance
Salutes Moore (December 12, 2001)