The Latest
Three’s a Crowd for Ejiofor, Pine, and Robbie in ‘Z for Zachariah’
The last time Craig Zobel premiered a film at the Sundance Film Festival, he wasn’t sure he’d make it out of the theater. After debuting his film Compliance in 2012, the film’s post-screening Q&A session was reduced to a shouting match as a combative audience member lobbed criticisms at the director’s intentions with the film. Earlier this year during Zobel’s second time around in Park City, the drama stayed on the screen.
Beck, Cat Power, and Others Go ‘Station to Station’
Is a film really a film if it’s actually more of a kinetic collage that weaves through canyons and countrysides, picking up Beck or Cat Power or the Kansas City Marching Cobras along the way? We like to think so, and Doug Aitken, the ever-inventive multimedia artist, often makes it so. Aitken’s newest project, Station to Station, can seem inscrutable at first. The Aitken-prescribed tagline, “62 one-minute films.
A Trip Down Memory Lane On Robert Redford’s Birthday
Sundance Institute’s president and founder—or, more suitably, the original creative heartbeat of this organization—turns 79 today. His wide-ranging accomplishments within the industry and beyond couldn’t possibly be embodied in a blog post, so we instead choose to celebrate with a more manageable, photo-driven trip down memory lane. Redford founded the Institute in 1981 and inaugurated what are now known as the Screenwriters and Directors Labs in the mountains of Utah, which to this day continue to expand to include even more creative disciplines.
Marielle Heller’s Sundance Hit ‘Diary of a Teenage Girl’ Explores a Sexual Coming-of-Age
While introducing The Diary of a Teenage Girl at the Sundance Film Festival, senior programmer David Courier prepared the audience to meet two striking new talents. He noted that he was honored to have Marielle Heller, an alum of the Sundance Institute Screenwriters and Directors Labs, return with her debut feature, and predicted actress Bel Powley’s future is “so bright that we’re going to be seeing her work here for years to come.”
This wasn’t typical pre-screening hyperbole.
Sundance Institute and Time Warner Foundation Select Ten Fellows for 2015 Artist Support Grants
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute and Time Warner Foundation announced today the ten artists selected for the 2015 Sundance Institute | Time Warner Foundation Fellowship Program, which recognizes and fosters the talent of diverse independent artists. These Fellowships and accompanying grants are part of the Institute’s year-round artist programs, including 24 residency labs and more than $2.5 million in grants for independent artists each year.
The Film That Takes You Inside a Counterterrorism Sting Needs Your Help
A woman at a recent Q&A for our film (T)ERROR asked us, “Were you afraid?” She didn’t specify, nor did she need to. We knew who, and what, she was referring to. She was asking if we were afraid of our own government.
The Spark: Introducing 3 New Feature Film Program Fellows
The word “spark” is defined as “a small fiery particle thrown off from a fire, alight in ashes, or produced by striking together two hard surfaces such as stone or metal.” It’s also a common term used to describe the earliest stage of a writer’s creative process. The big idea—urgent and unrelenting—that seduces the artist and compels her to tell a specific story.
Sundance Institute and The Metroplex Proudly Present 2015 Sundance Film Festival: Hong Kong
Hong Kong – 11 August, 2015) With last year’s success of the Sundance Film Festival – Hong Kong Selects, which brought a series of curated American independent films to the city for the first time, Sundance Institute and The Metroplex will once again present the 2015 Sundance Film Festival: Hong Kong from September 17 to 27, screening 11 films featured in the Festival at Park City, Utah, U.S.A.
Dance Parties, Mummified Legs, and Robot Love – A Weekend at Sundance NEXT FEST
Last night we wrapped up NEXT FEST with a one-of-a-kind dance party at the Theatre at Ace Hotel, as Neon Indian and Toro y Moi jointly sent LA film fans off into the sunset. The part-film, part-music, part-special guest medley was hosted at a veritable movie palace (a beautifully restored 1920s United Artists) and offered a perfect backdrop for everything from an oddball documentary about a missing mummified leg (Finders Keepers) to sweet serenades from Sharon Van Etten. Take a look at some of our highlights from a great weekend of film and music at NEXT FEST.
Q&A: Coming of Age with Sky Ferreira
At one point during our recent conversation, Sky Ferreira empathized with Lorelei Linklater, daughter of director Richard Linklater and an actress in his Oscar-winning drama Boyhood. The parallels proved uncanny to the 23-year-old singer, who heard the story of Lorelei bawling her way through her first viewing of the film. It was a reaction to reliving her coming-of-age—including, in its entirety the “awkward phase.
Sundance NEXT FEST adds Special Guests, Music Video World Premieres and Virtual Reality Flight Simulator
Los Angeles, CA — A tidal wave of new ideas washes ashore for Sundance NEXT FEST at The Theatre at Ace Hotel Downtown Los Angeles this weekend, including newly added special guests, three world premiere music videos and a full-body, mind-blowing virtual reality flight simulator, Birdly. Sundance NEXT FEST, August 7-9, is a weekend celebration of the renegade spirit of independent artists, featuring what’s new and next in film and music. Tickets ($15-25) are on sale now at sundance.
‘Marwencol’ Director Jeff Malmberg Shares His Sundance Lab Experience
Arriving at the Sundance Institute Documentary Edit & Story Lab as an advisor on my first day, fellow advisor and editor Kate Amend greeted me with a hearty, “Welcome to paradise.” She said it in a way that seemed to reference more than just the beautiful surroundings. I didn’t know exactly what she was alluding to, but I had heard this kind of thing many times before.
Jason Segel Enlisted Book Club Buds to Channel David Foster Wallace in ‘The End of the Tour’
Judging from conversations and Twitter activity in the moments before the world premiere screening of The End of the Tour at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, there was as much trepidation as there was excitement about the prospect of the life of the late, great author David Foster Wallace being dramatized on film. Yet even though the film, and actor Jason Segel in particular, made great pains to evoke Wallace’s singular way of talking, thinking, and being, it turned out that The End of the Tour is far from a biopic—it documents just a few days at the end of the author’s press tour for Infinite Jest—and rather uses writer David Lipsky’s best-selling account of his time reporting an ultimately unpublished profile of Wallace for Rolling Stone as a jumping off point for a rumination on fame, American manhood, and loneliness, among many other things. It’s also, despite a bigger budget and stars like Segel, Jesse Eisenberg, and Joan Cusack, very much a deeply felt James Ponsoldt (Smashed, The Spectacular Now) film.
5 Questions With Television Editor Erica Freed Marker
Erica Freed Marker is the recipient of the 2015 Sally Menke Memorial Editing Fellowship. The fellowship honors the memory of the beloved Sundance Institute mentor and prolific editor Sally Menke by supporting an emerging narrative editor’s understanding of craft, expanding their artistic community, and providing momentum to their editing career through participation in the Directors Lab and year-round mentorship from several accomplished editors. This year, Marker will work closely with Dylan Tichenor (co-editor, Zero Dark Thirty, The Town, There Will be Blood) and two other editing mentors.
Six Directors Selected for Sundance Institute | LUMA Foundation
New York, NY — Six theatre directors will participate in the third Sundance Institute | LUMA Foundation Theatre Directors Retreat in Arles, France, July 31 through August 12. The Retreat is part of the Institute’s year-round work with the theatre community and is one of 24 residency Labs the Institute hosts each year for independent artists in theatre, film, new media and episodic content.
Under the supervision of Theatre Program Artistic Director Philip Himberg, Producing Director Christopher Hibma and Program Associate Anne Kauffman, the Retreat is the only theatre director-centered residency of its kind.