Category: News

Filmmaker Sean Baker has garnered applause and accolades year-round since premiering Tangerine, his “like-nothing-you’ve-ever-seen” film that channels relentless candor and realism in a refreshingly honest portrayal of transgender sex workers in Los Angeles. To kick off awards season, the film and its team received four Film Independent Spirit Awards nominations in an announcement that also saw Sundance favorites The Diary of a Teenage Girl and It Follows make plenty of noise. Below, we take a look at all of the Sundance-supported films and filmmakers nominated for the 31st Film Independent Spirit Awards.

Park City, UT — Adrenaline junkies and genre film-lovers know the real fun at the Sundance Film Festival starts at midnight. Sundance Institute tonight offers a first look at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival by announcing the nine feature films that will screen in its iconic Midnight section, which has launched films including The Blair Witch Project, SAW, Super Troopers, The Babadook, Black Dynamite, What We Do In The Shadows, Dead/Alive, Delicatessen, The Descent and Hard Candy. Explore this year’s nine Midnight films — seven of which feature badass leading ladies — in more detail on the Festival’s Digital Program Guide.

Los Angeles, CA — The second Sundance Institute | TED Prize Filmmaker Award, including a $125,000 grant, has been awarded to Havana Marking for her short documentary Bloody Money about corruption in the Ukrainian government — featuring the work of TED Prize winner Charmian Gooch of Global Witness whose TED Wish was to end anonymous shell companies.
Bloody Money, currently in production, is a financial thriller that follows an extraordinary story from Kiev to London to Washington, D.C.

Los Angeles, CA – Sundance Institute and Jaunt Studios announced today their collaboration to launch a groundbreaking cinematic virtual reality residency program designed to empower artists on the cutting edge of storytelling. The first artist selected to participate in the six-month Sundance Institute New Frontier | Jaunt VR Residency Program is Lynette Wallworth, and three additional artists will be selected to participate in the coming months. Through this collaboration, Sundance Institute’s New Frontier program will continue a long tradition of cultivating new voices and innovative stories from the independent storytelling community, with Jaunt providing resident artists with the most advanced resources in cinematic virtual reality production.

Four 18-to-24-year-old Native Artists will Attend 2016 Sundance Film Festival, Develop Storytelling Skills and New Film Projects Throughout the Year
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute announced today the four 18-to-24-year-old Native American filmmakers — three from the Southwest and one from Michigan — selected for the 2016 Full Circle Fellowships. Following Sundance Institute President and Founder Robert Redford’s original vision and commitment to supporting Native American artists, the Full Circle Fellowship program develops and supports young Native filmmakers and is part of the Institute’s year-round support offerings for Native artists at all stages of their careers.
The Full Circle Fellowship Program, launched last year with support from the W.

Sundance Institute’s first-ever workshop at IFP-Minnesota in St. Paul drew more than 40 emerging and experienced documentarians to a daylong series of instructional sessions last weekend.
As participants, some pitching projects, were treated to presentations on nonfiction storytelling structure and how to make regional stories relevant to larger audiences, running themes included the importance of preparedness and the need, according to Twin Cities native Annie Sundberg, to “keep your key audience in mind” at every stage of production.

As we prepare for yet another Sundance Film Festival, we thought we’d take some time to update you on everything you need to know about our ticketing system. Thank you for your continued interest in seeing world-class
independent films, panels, music, and New Frontier installations at the
2021 Festival. We look forward to seeing you in January!Through small (but important!) modifications to our system and extensive testing, we’re confident you’ll have a seamless experience this year.

New York, NY — Sundance Institute today announced the projects and artists participating in its two Fall artist development programs: the Alumni Writers Studio at Flying Point in Water Mill, NY, which ran October 4-11, as well as the two-week Theatre Lab for musical theatre, ensemble-generated projects and solo work at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), taking place November 8-22. Under the supervision of Artistic Director Philip Himberg and Producing Director Christopher Hibma, the initiatives are among the 24 residency Labs the Institute hosts each year for independent artists in theatre, film, new media and episodic content.
The Alumni Writers Studio at Flying Point offers four invited Theatre Program alumni and one Feature Film Program Alum an uninterrupted period of time and the space to work on their projects in a studio setting.

First and foremost, we’re sincerely sorry for the inconvenience you experienced with our ticketing system today. We’ve spent the last few weeks preparing for ticket sales to start today but experienced some very unfortunate (to put it mildly) technical issues beyond anything we could have anticipated. So we made the very difficult decision to stop the sale of passes and packages for the day so we can rectify the problems and restart the sale next week.

Art is intended to vanquish walls, not construct them. As is well documented in cinema, that struggle is an ongoing one. Among the lesser-publicized barriers in the film world is the factor of age, and today’s Sundance Ignite program announcement makes a go of mitigating that qualification.

Los Angeles, CA — Believing that 18-to-24-year-olds will lead us into our creative future with more than memes and Snapchats, Sundance Institute today announced a new project to inspire and connect young independent filmmakers and audiences. The Sundance Ignite program will offer 18-to-24-year-olds exclusive access to independent film and filmmaking experiences, including at the Sundance Film Festival, which over the course of its 30-year history has launched films such as Napoleon Dynamite, Jawbreaker, Tangerine, Heathers, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, Dope, Bachelorette, Whiplash, The Spectacular Now, The Way, Way Back, The Blair Witch Project and SAW.
The Sundance Ignite program, with support from Adobe through its Project 1324 initiative, will host an online short film challenge for 18-to-24-year-old filmmakers, and five winners will attend the 2016 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.

Park City, UT — Sundance Institute and the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities announced today that Sundance Film Forward will host free screenings of acclaimed independent films and moderated discussions and workshops with talented filmmakers October 20-23. The events will take place in a range of venues from the program’s host, the Bill Cosford Cinema at University of Miami, to small community centers, including branches of the Miami-Dade Public Library System.
Sundance Film Forward is a touring program of film screenings and discussions to excite and cultivate new audiences for independent film, with a special focus on 18- to 24-year-olds.