Our annual chart once again lists all the American independent features appearing at last year's Sundance Film Festival that have gone on to significant domestic theatrical release in 1997. As always, a few of last year's features (like triple award-winner Hurricane Streets) are still scheduled for release in the coming year. Films marked with an asterisk are still in their theatrical runs; numbers are partial figures accurate as of December 10, 1997. Thanks to EDI for helping compile the box-office figures.

The "Budget" estimates are just that -- estimates. Culled from previously published reports, interviews with the filmmakers, or our own estimations, these numbers may not reflect the finishing costs needed to take some of these films from their festival release to your local theater.

A "Festival" column tracks which Sundance films also played the following key international festivals: Berlin (B), Cannes (C), New York (N), Toronto (T), Rotterdam (R), and Venice (V).

As always, note that domestic box office gross is just one indicator of a film's overall financial performance. Re-viewing this list, it's clear that the ambitions and intentions of the various distributors differed widely. Some of these films, particularly those with a genre or casting hook, received perfunctory theatrical releases designed to garner more money in the video, television, and foreign ancillary markets. Other films depended on U.S. theatrical box office to launch them in other markets and, consequently, received more vigorous releases. Still others were films whose release was halted after they underperformed in early key markets.