Here we are, the glorious Sundance Film Festival 09′ in Park City Utah has come to an end! Man, it has been one awesome / exhausting trip. I just want to start by saying I am so grateful that I was given this opportunity to go on such an enriching journey that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. Ever since I can remember, which is pretty much back to my terrible twos, I can remember having a deep interest which blossomed into full on love for film. I have always been the person who gets overly emotional during a film and will start tearing up or straight out bawling. Or I will be on the floor laughing uncontrollably, preferrably the latter. Although, I do like a good cry every now and then, it’s therapeutic.

I have been lucky to indulge in this interest and study film at Eckerd, taking some extremely interesting and fun courses where I have actually worked on the making of short films. I hope to pursue a career which can be like a creative outlet for me, like tv and film!

I made various connections both business wise and friend wise! I climbed the never ending staircase to heaven (our beautiful condo, situated perfectly on Empire Avenue, looking over mainstreet.) I walked wide-eyed up the infamous main street, taking in all the people and places. I shmoozed with the rich and famous, (mostly extremely friendly and talented filmmakers I met at slamdance) which was an experience in it of itself. I feel as though I soaked up as much as I could, although I do wish I took the time to watch a few more movies, since the whole point of the trip was watching film! I have taken away a new understanding and appreciation of independent films and I definitely hope to be able to attend the Sundance Film Festival again, and bombard my brain with more films that will leave me questioning and anticipating more.

I also want to note the great experience I had volunteering at Slamdance, Slamdance might be (according to some) a smaller festival formed by the “reject” films from Sundance, but to me it is right up there with Sundance if not cooler! All the people I met / worked with were super friendly and made my time there quite pleasant. I also saw most of the films that Real Ideas Studio worked on with Slamdance in the aspiring filmmakers film competition, all of these films were quite good and inspiring! 

Here is a quick review of all the films I saw and what they were each about: (more…)

Mississippi Damned

Lizzie and I had the chance to see the excellent Mississippi Damned at the Slamdance Film Festival, and while waiting in line we met the director and the editor of the film. We were both impressed by the story, cinematography, and the editing - the film immediately gives a strong impression of place, and the mood of the film alternates between a poetic and recollective style and an intense immediacy. The performances throughout the film were quite strong and the characters were utterly convincing.

Here’s a brief interview with the director, Tina Mabry. For more about the film, check out Lizzie’s review, and the film’s website.

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An open letter to the Sundancing team this year from a former student (now in film school):

Author Ryan Conrath and Zhang Yuan, director of 13 films including Beijing Bastards

Sundance is for many just an idea. It’s something that looms over countless student productions. It’s a running joke in film school: “When we get into Sundance…” In another sense, it’s also taken very seriously. It was a big deal when a colleague’s film got into Slamdance. The same guy’s movies have even been shown at Harvard and Cannes. But to my knowledge, Sundance still remains for him the elusive beast that it is for thousands upon thousands of expectant students and professionals.

Again, as an idea, Sundance is probably the most powerful force in American film today. It is almost more of a bragging point to say that your movie got into Sundance than it is to say it was optioned by Hollywood. (more…)

A girl plays by the rapidly eroding shoreline, in Everything's Cool

Sundance has had a green streak for a long time. It goes deeper than the new line of organic cotton festival wear, and the reliable influx of hybrid vehicles into town for the week. Films like An Inconvenient Truth, Blue Vinyl, Everything’s Cool, The Unforeseen, Who Killed the Electric Car, Fields of Fuel, Flow, Manufactured Landscapse, Up the Yangtze all premiered at Sundance over the last few years and all focus heavily on themes of environmental change and of connections between people and their environments. The festival’s related commitment to Native American stories goes back to its beginnings.

I always pay close attention to such films because of my involvement with Eckerd College’s “Visions of Nature, Voices of Nature,” Environmental Film Festival, that I have co-directed along with its founder Cathy Griggs for the past three years, and that began as a Native American film festival. For several years, we have tried to supplement the February lineup with at least one film that had just shown for the first time at Sundance. Last year it was Up the Yangtze and The Unforeseen (which played Sundance in 2007), and before that we screened Everything’s Cool. It goes beyond documentary. We have also screened fictional feature films from Sundance, films in which place plays a prominent role, such as Chris Eyre’s Edge of America, Jake Mahaffy’s War, and Kevin Wilmott’s CSA: Confederate States of America. (Kevin Wilmott is back again this year, with a western that I discuss below). We’ll see whether we can manage to pull it off again this year. (more…)