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Photo By Steve Ramos
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Park City’s Main Street is Sundance’s snowy ground
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PARK CITY, UTAH -- The deal-making began thousands of miles from Park City, Utah. It was an American Airlines flight from New York to Salt Lake City. On board were TV celebrities like Joshua Jackson and cult filmmakers like Mark Borchardt. Talk about this year's Sundance Film Festival quickly overwhelmed the airplane sermonizing by a group of Jehovah's Witnesses.
A New York City fireman, Bill Moore, was traveling with valuable luggage -- the script to his movie about New York during the World Trade Center terrorist attack on Sept. 11. Moore was feeling good about his debut script. He knew that film industry types at the Sundance Film Festival would be interested in dramas about Sept. 11. He was also confident that, at meetings scheduled with producers for later in the week, his script would be sold. After all, Moore had first-hand knowledge of Ground Zero.
Here at Park City -- Sundance's ground zero -- Moore's Sept. 11 story was bound to be in high demand.
The aftermath of Sept. 11 was high on people's minds during the 2002 Sundance Festival. Entering the festival's 21st year, Sundance founder Robert Redford talked about the need for an independent and cinematic response to the terrorist attacks.
"In the last while, we had incredible changes take place," Redford said. "There was the warped and depressing election process that threatened our democratic principals. There was the recession and the cataclysmic Sept. 11. Audiences are starving for a new kind of diversity. Audiences want to see something they haven't seen before."
The Sundance Festival is no longer the offbeat, fringe festival it used to be. It's grown to nearly 300 films and approximately 20,000 attendees.
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Photo By Steve Ramos
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Nicole Kidman faces the Sundance army outside the
premiere of her film Birthday Girl
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For 10 colorful days, life is turned upside-down at Park City, a small ski-resort town nestled in the mountains outside Salt Lake City. The festival has cemented its reputation as the most important film event in the United States. Hosting an "official" marketplace for the first time, film industry executives found it easier to seek out the latest breakout film.
Away from the buying and selling, reporters, paparazzi and locals seek out celebrity sightings. Sundance is a 10-day marathon that tests one's patience and stamina. It's amazing to witness the impact that bitter cold and sleep deprivation make on audiences here.
For years, Sundance has been the home for challenging films willing to test the boundaries of independent cinema. In light of Sept. 11, the need for Sundance-variety filmmaking seemed greater than ever. Still, it's impossible to keep the faithful here from having fun.
Publicity Sundance-style is as wild as anything witnessed at Cannes or Toronto.
Nicole Kidman came to Park City to promote her new film, Birthday Girl. Meeting throngs of fans outside the Eccles Theatre, her visit was like a final victory lap in celebration of her success with Moulin Rouge and The Others.
"I've been to a lot of festivals this year," a smiling Kidman told a Japanese TV crew. "I've been to Venice, Toronto, Cannes and now here."
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Photo By Steve Ramos
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Matthew McConaughey poses for the press with
Thirteen Conversations About One Thing director Jill
Sprecher and co-star Clea Duvall
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Nothing launches a film like celebrity oomph. Jennifer Aniston's appearance on the arm of her heartthrob husband Brad Pitt helped boost the profile of her film, the comic drama The Good Girl.
Jodie Foster made an appearance on behalf of the coming-of-age drama, The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys. Robin Williams shed his shirt in the Utah cold, all for the sake of promoting his Sundance film, the drama One Hour Photo. Russell Crowe made an appearance in support of the documentary film, Texas, about his band, 30 Odd Foot of Grunts.
Julianne Moore, seven months pregnant, arrived to support husband Bart Freundlich's newest film, World Traveler. Matthew McConaughey greeted the crowds outside the premiere of his film Thirteen Conversations About One Thing.
Film festivals have always been about the beautiful people. At Sundance, the goal is to keep the spotlight on those bold filmmakers responsible for the type of challenging dramas that are a festival trademark.
Writer/director Karen Moncrieff insisted she wouldn't know what to do with an army of paparazzi. As it was, she was feeling overwhelmed by all the attention of reporters who've declared her film, the searing drama Blue Car, as the festival's real breakout.
Made on a shoestring, Blue Car was purchased by Miramax Films, the distributor for last year's Sundance favorite, In the Bedroom. Asked by a reporter if she plans to go Hollywood, Moncrieff, 38, laughed loudly.
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Photo By Steve Ramos
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Blue Car writer/director Karen Moncrieff
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"I can promise you this," she said. "I will never make X-Men 3."
With its complex storytelling and somber tone, Blue Car was the most challenging of this year's Sundance dramas. The film tells the story of a troubled 18-year-old girl, Meg (Agnes Bruckner), who writes poetry to get through life. Her English teacher, Mr. Auster (David Strathairn), becomes her father figure and encourages her to enter a national poetry contest where he serves as one of the judges. At the contest, their student/teacher relationship turns into something more complex.
"This movie was made for no money," Moncrieff said, speaking at a local restaurant. "We shot outside Dayton, Ohio, because we couldn't afford to make it in Los Angeles. I'm so thrilled by all that has happened. I know that this is the kind of stories I'm interested in telling. But I also believe that these type of true-to-life stories are what many people want to see.
"I know that my dad isn't interested in a film like Blue Car, but I think there are many people who are."
Director Patricia Cordoso's Latina tale, Real Women Have Curves, was the winner of this year's Dramatic Audience Award. Its story about a young Mexican-American girl's dream to leave Los Angeles and attend college is plenty mainstream. At a festival panel about Latin American filmmaking, when asked by an audience member if she's dedicated to Latino stories, Cordoso's answer received plenty of boos and catcalls.
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Photo By Steve Ramos
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World Traveler writer/director Bart Freundlich and his
actress/wife Jullianne Moore
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"I told them that I didn't see myself solely as a Latina filmmaker," said Cordoso, a native Columbian, wiping away her tears. "I said that I only want to make good movies that are popular with audiences. I told them that I make universal movies. That's when everybody attacked me.
"They accused me of being ashamed of being a Latina. I didn't know what to do. I never expected to be treated like that."
Diversity was a key theme at this year's festival. New York stories like director Gary Winick's coming-of-age comedy Tadpole shared screen time with the Latino drama Manito and the family drama World Traveler.
In World Traveler, when the World Trade Center appears on-screen, the audience breathes a sigh of relief. It's an image they want to see again.
"I think the World Trade Towers look beautiful in the movie," Moore said, speaking alongside her husband. "The story is set in a particular time and place, and the towers are part of that time and place. I'm glad they're in the movie. I think it celebrates New York."
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Photo By Steve Ramos
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Tadpole star Aaron Standford and director Gary Winick
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Women's stories grabbed a lion's share of the Sundance spotlight. Writer/director Rebecca Miller's Personal Velocity, a trilogy of women's tales, won the Dramatic Grand Jury Prize and the Cinematography Award. Daughter of Danang, about the hard-fought reunion between a Vietnamese mother and her daughter, won the Documentary Grand Jury Prize. Sister Helen, a documentary about a crusty Benedictine nun who manages a home for recovering addicts and alcoholics, won the Documentary Directing Award.
The happiest moment belonged to Cordoso. Her award for Real Women Have Curves felt exceptionally sweet after she bore the brunt of criticisms and verbal attacks.
"This is the type of award that means the most to me," Cordoso said, beaming. "I've always believed in making movies for audiences. The fact that audiences picked Real Women Have Curves as their favorite is something I'll never forget."
Nine films were bought during this year's festival. More are rumored to be close to a deal.
Beautiful people like Kidman and Crowe will continue to call Sundance home. More importantly, bold filmmakers like Karen Moncrieff will use Sundance as the launching pad for future careers.
Sundance attendees left Park City in a rush to make the Golden Globes Awards. The themes of Sept. 11 and the kind of real-life films people want to see in its aftermath continue to resonate. By the end of the festival, however, fireman Moore had failed to sell his story about Sept. 11 heroics.
Other stories will take its place. Likely, these stories will find their first audiences at a future Sundance.
Read Steve's Sundance Diaries
