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Sundance Announces Live and Online Presentation Details of Its 2021 Festival
Photo: Kelsey Doyle, courtesy Sundance Institute. The Sundance Institute announced details of its 2021 edition — plans that will see Sundance offer titles to home audiences via a custom-designed online platform while socially-distanced live events (continent upon local health and safety guidelines at the time of the screenings) will occur in Park City, Utah as well as at a number of “satellite screens” across the country.
Running January 28 – February 3, 2021, the Sundance Film Festival will stream its more than 70 features in three-hour blocks throughout the day, with films beginning simultaneously “to preserve the energy of a Festival,” according to the press release. Films will be accompanied by live Q&As and then will return to the platform two days later for a 24-hour on-demand windows.
“Even under these impossible circumstances artists are still finding paths to make bold and vital work in whatever ways they can,” said debuting Sundance Festival Director Tabitha Jackson in the press release. “So Sundance, as a festival of discovery, will bring that work to its first audiences in whatever ways we can. The core of our Festival in the form of an online platform and socially distanced cinematic experiences is responsive to the pandemic and gives us the opportunity to reach new audiences, safely, where they are. And thanks to a constellation of independent cinema communities across the U.S. we are not putting on our Festival alone. At the heart of all this is a belief in the power of coming together, and the desire to preserve what makes a festival unique — a collaborative spirit, a collective energy, and a celebration of the art, artists, and ideas that leave us changed.”
“Our Festival footprint has changed this year, but we are excited to bring an incredible community together in new ways to engage with new artists and new stories — whether they’re joining us for the first year or have been for decades,” continued Sundance Institute Executive Director Keri Putnam. “Our ambition is for everyone to come together, safely, wherever they may be, and participate in screenings on our platform at the same time. The Sundance team has consulted with artists, worked with incredible partners, and built a plan to welcome new audiences and capture a true Festival spirit.”
The Festival’s vibrant New Frontier section will continue with 14 works accessible via computer and VR headsets and within a virtual platform offering interactive social activities and connection. Sundance’s Short Film and Indie Series (formerly Indie Episodic) will include 50 short films and four episodic premieres and will be available via the platform for the full run of the festival.
All feature titles will be available to U.S. audiences through the Shift72-powered movie player, with some films opting for global availability. (Shift72 also powered the Toronto International Film Festival and New York Film Festival’s players.) Along with the New Frontier, Short Films and Indie Series selections, the festival’s talks and events programming will be available worldwide. Various elements of the live Sundance experience, such as Festival Village, Main Street and the Festival Lounge, will receive online recreations, with the former offering “a free-to-all space where Satellite Screens, partners, and Festival sponsors will host a wide range of events, programming, and offerings to complement and enrich the official program.”
As for the live screenings, they’ll be programmed by Sundance at the The Ray in Park City and at the Rose Bowl and Mission Tiki Drive-Ins in Los Angeles. The various Satellite Screen partners “will create and host their own events, sharing local cultural conversations with broader Festival audiences, with most also screening selections from the 2021 program.” Commented Jackson, “These partners are the backbone of independent artistic communities across the country, where filmmakers are born and cinephiles are developed,” said Jackson. “We’re entering these partnerships because a healthy ecosystem for artists and audiences requires that independent cinemas across the country survive and thrive.”
The Sundance Film Festival’s program selection will be released later this month, and additional details regarding the Satellite Screens will evolve alongside their local areas’ COVID-19 pandemic health and safety guidelines.
Participating U.S. partner organizations and Satellite Screen locations include:
Alabama: Birmingham with Sidewalk Film Festival
Sidewalk Film Center, Sidewalk Drive-In
Arizona: Tucson with The Loft Cinema
The Loft Open Air Cinema
California:
Montclair with American Cinematheque
Mission Tiki Drive-In
Pasadena with the Rose Bowl
Rose Bowl Drive-In
San Francisco with The Roxie Theater
Roxie Theater, Fort Mason Drive-In
Colorado: Denver with Denver Film
Sie FilmCenter
Florida:
Key West with Tropic Cinema
Tropic Cinema, The Key West Lighthouse, The Truman Little White House, The Ernest Hemingway House and Museum
Miami with Third Horizon and O Cinema
South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center
Georgia:
Atlanta with Atlanta Film Society
The Plaza Theater, Plaza Drive-In, Dad’s Garage Drive-In
Macon with Macon Film Festival
Douglass Theatre
Hawaii: Honolulu with Doris Duke Theatre at the Honolulu Museum of Art (HoMA)
Iowa: Iowa City with FilmScene
FilmScene at The Chauncey
Kansas: Wichita with mama.film
mama.film microcinema, Wichita Art Museum, Groover Labs
Kentucky: Louisville with The Speed Art Museum
Speed Art Museum
Louisiana: New Orleans with New Orleans Film Society
The Broad Theater
Maryland: Baltimore with Maryland Film Festival
Stavros Niarchos Foundation Parkway Theater
Massachusetts: Brookline with Coolidge Corner Theatre
Coolidge Corner Theatre
Michigan: Detroit with Cinema Detroit
Minnesota: Minneapolis-St. Paul with FilmNorth
Riverview Theater
New York: Pleasantville with The Jacob Burns Film Center
Jacob Burns Film Center & Media Arts Lab
Ohio: Columbus with Gateway Film Center
Gateway Film Center
Oklahoma: Tulsa with Circle Cinema
Circle Cinema, Circle Cinema Drive-In, Admiral Twin Drive-In, Philbrook Museum, OSU-Tulsa, Tulsa University, Gilcrease Museum
Pennsylvania: Philadelphia with BlackStar Film Festival
Puerto Rico: San Juan with Asociación de Documentalistas de Puerto Rico (AdocPR)
Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico (MAPR)
South Carolina: Columbia with The Luminal Theater
Spotlight Cinemas Capitol 8
Tennessee:
Memphis with Indie Memphis
Malco Summer Drive-In
Nashville with Belcourt Theatre
Belcourt Theatre
Texas:
Austin with Austin Film Society
AFS Cinema
Dallas with Aviation Cinemas
Texas Theatre
Houston with Houston Cinema Arts Society
MoonStruck Drive-In, DeLUXE Theater
Utah:
Park City
The Ray
Salt Lake City with Salt Lake Film Society
Washington:
Seattle with Northwest Film Forum
