Sundance
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“BLACK ROCK” | director, Katie Aselton
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 11:45 pm –Library Center Theatre, Park City] For me, there is nothing like the experience of walking into a theater and escaping with a movie for couple of hours. The smell of popcorn, your feet sticking to the floor, the shared experience with those around you… that can’t be duplicated at home on your t.v., your computer, your iPad, whatever. Going to a movie theater is truly special. To be a part of that experience and be able take people on that two hour journey is exciting. It’s an honor for me to do so.
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“4 SUNS” | writer-director, Bohdan Sláma
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 6:00 pm –Egyptian Theatre, Park City] The best thing in the world is singing. But for someone who can’t sing, like me, film is the perfect form of expression.
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“THE FIRST TIME” | director, Jonathan Kasdan
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 12:15 pm –Eccles Theatre, Park City] I have no rhythm. I was twelve years old. I was taking guitar lessons. In the middle of my fifth lesson my teacher just stopped, started putting away his guitar. I was like, “What are you doing? We still got 40 minutes.” He said, “Kid, you have no rhythm. Whatsoever. You can’t even clap to the beat. You will never be a musician. Ever.” So the truth is, if I had my druthers, I would be a rock star today – and the medium for my story would be […]
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“WHERE DO WE GO NOW?” | director, Nadine Labaki’a
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 2:45 pm –Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] Growing up in Lebanon as a little girl, my childhood was synchronized between home and shelter. Living in a country adorned in politics, secular perturbations, and injustice, our lives evolved around continuous wars. Most of our days were spent in confinement behind sacks of sand. There were times when it was too dangerous to even leave our homes. We couldn’t go to school, we couldn’t go outside to play, and we couldn’t practice what normal childhood was. Early on, I started developing a unique relationship with the TV […]
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WRITER/DIRECTOR CRAIG ZOBEL ON “COMPLIANCE”
Following the adventures of two mismatched salesman hawking vanity recording deals for a small Southern recording label, Craig Zobel’s 2007 Sundance picture Great World of Sound is a beautifully crafted debut feature, emotionally rich and with a sagacious perspective on America’s escalating obsession with fame. And in the months following its release, the banter between the two men, and the hapless vocalists aiming for an America’s Got Talent-style brass ring by way of a cheaply-produced studio single, must have made the film seem like a comedy to those who missed its lacerating moral critique. That’s because, as Zobel notes below, […]
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Detropia | Directors/Producers Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21, Noon –Temple Theatre, Park City] Rachel Grady: I’m a documentary filmmaker because it’s basically like going to an amazing graduate school with each new project. And getting paid to do it. It gives you an excuse to learn, explore, hypothesize, get it wrong, change your mind, discover new ideas and then share your results with complete strangers. That’s extremely fun to me. Heidi Ewing: In our view, there is no other medium that is better suited for Detroit than the medium of documentary film. The slew of popular picture books about the city and its […]
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“THE HOUSE I LIVE IN” | director, Eugene Jarecki
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 6:00 pm –Temple Theatre, Park City] “Why am I a filmmaker?” I often ask myself the same question. I ask it because first and foremost I guess I am less an artist than simply a small-p-political person who is moved by human struggle anywhere around me and who, however naively or presumptuously, wants to do something about it. My new film, The House I Live In, examines the destructive impact of the War on Drugs on poor and minority Americans and what can be done to reform it. It is my most personal film to […]
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“FOR ELLEN” | writer-director, So Yung Kim
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21, 5:30 pm –Library Center Theatre, Park City] I was lucky enough to fall into filmmaking. I tried other art forms like painting and performance, but there was something lacking. Then I helped my husband Brad make his first feature film. I found the experience inspiring and so I began to make my own films. With each film I have been learning, not just about filmmaking, but also about life and myself. I started to write For Ellen when I was filled with anxiety and doubts about being a decent parent, a loving partner, and a […]
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“TWENTY-EIGHT HOTELS ROOMS” | writer-director, Matt Ross
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday, January 21 5:30 pm –Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] The most truthful answer I can come up with as to why my story is told as a film (and not a novel or a play) is this: the most profound narrative experiences I have had have been in a dark movie theatre. One of the first films I can remember seeing was Jaws. I must have been about five. The experience was seared into my brain. It was horrifying, primal. Even now, as an adult, so many years later, every time I swim or surf in the […]
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“ME AT THE ZOO” | directors, Chris Moukarbel & Valerie Veatch
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Saturday , January 21 9:00 pm – Temple Theatre, Park City] Our film Me @ The Zoo began in another form entirely. We were making a long form art video for the NYC-based arts organization Rhizome. The artwork was about exploring the ways that technology mediates our lives as a generation comes of age watching reality television and using social media. It seemed like what is considered to be performance has shifted and “acting” was losing ground as a popular medium. Video technology enables us to turn the content of our lives into a kind of show. If you […]
