Sundance Responses
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Fire in the Blood | Director Dylan Mohan Gray
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 3:00pm — Sundance Resort Screening Room, Sundance Resort] Metaphysically-speaking, there were many times during the more than five years it took to make this film when I felt like I had sacrificed my sanity and freedom… I suppose every documentary filmmaker experiences similar despondency at some point or other, but there were certainly long periods when it seemed like I was desperately trying to find my way through a labyrinth in the fog, and because I had no documentary community to look to for support and guidance here in Mumbai, it was often very lonely. […]
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Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer | Co-Director Mike Lerner
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 8:30pm — Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] I am the co-director of Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer and an executive producer on Jehane Noujaim’s The Square. The concept of sacrifice is at the heart of both movies. It would be hard to exaggerate the sacrifices made by the thousands of young people who have spent two years battling for freedom and justice in Egypt. Many have died, been tortured, beaten and arrested and their sacrifice and that of their families will be recognised as one of the most significant in Egypt’s long history. What the protestors […]
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The Gatekeepers | Director Dror Moreh
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, Noon — Temple Theatre, Park City] Telling the story of a country in the last 45 years, especially when the storytellers are the heads of the secret service, required a lot of sacrifices to be made; especially in depth and length of content. We spent a long time in the editing room, and our first cut was 3.5 hours. The biggest challenge is to understand where the heart of the film lies. One hard decision, for example, was the personal childhood stories of The Gatekeepers, especially the story of Avraham Shalom, who was born in […]
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The Crash Reel | Director Lucy Walker
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 6:30pm — Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center, Salt Lake City] A good film takes great sacrifice. A great film takes an almost unbearable amount. Malcolm Gladwell says it takes 10,000 hours to get good at something. That’s nothing compared to making good documentary. A good film is like an iceberg, for every bit you can see there’s at least 10 times more work invisibly undergirding it. The scenes and characters that didn’t make the cut, the cuts that were recut, the time you invested researching, the time you spend waiting for the right shot, going […]
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Newlyweeds | Director Shaka King
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 11:30am — Prospector Square Theatre] Making a movie, you’re expected to sacrifice sleep and if you’re fortunate enough to have one, a life…for a time. Even sanity, some say. But in the context of making this film, I prefer to think of sacrifice in the vein of sacrificing a chicken or a goat to a spirit. Sacrificial sacrifice. For something magical you could never understand. Because making this film was that for me. There were no “Damn, I wish I was doing something else” days. I didn’t get sick. I wasn’t at war with a lover. It […]
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Austenland | Director Jerusha Hess
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 12:15pm — Eccles Theatre] It’s funny, just getting a moment to address this interview question is a small sacrifice. It’s Christmastime, my kids are out of school and wild beyond reason, my husband just got back from a long work trip (making said kids wild), there are neighborhood Christmas gifts piled all over the house, a birthday party to throw together tonight, a possible baby to adopt, and a dog to bathe….sacrifice….isn’t that a synonym with motherhood already. So when asked what I sacrificed to make Austenland — it’s obvious to everyone who saw my kids that […]
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Escape From Tomorrow | Director Randy Moore
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 5:30pm — Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] Being a first time filmmaker is a strange labor. You don’t know anything, but you need to act like you do. In order for this to work, you really have to sacrifice that rational part of your thinking and lie, like Demi Moore’s character in the movie Indecent Proposal. You might even say, “It’s just my body… it’s not my mind,” but you know that that’s not true! The whole world thinks you’re completely insane, and it’s nearly impossible to convince them otherwise. After our first preview screening, […]
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God Loves Uganda | Director Roger Ross Williams
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 11:30am — Library Center Theatre, Park City] Films don’t compromise. They don’t sacrifice. Directors do. That’s something I’ve always believed — but it was only on God Loves Uganda that I’ve had to confront that conviction, and act on it in a way that put my life in danger. While shooting in Uganda in 2010, the conservative evangelical pastors I was filming — the most ardent supporters of the country’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill — discovered that I myself am gay. One began circulating emails suggesting that I be killed. I left the country immediately, and hoped […]
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Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes | Director Francesca Gregorini
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 5:30pm — Library Center Theatre, Park City] Film is a child; full of potential and yet utterly helpless and destined to die without your intimate care, vigilant eye, and tireless guidance. It just doesn’t end. Even when you think it has, it just plain hasn’t. It’s hungry all the time. Crying, seemingly for no good reason and often for very good reasons. Its needs are boundless, in both a rudimentary and an existential way. Even when it’s fully grown, you’ve done your job, it’s out the door, found a home of it’s own… it still knows […]
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Pandora’s Promise | Director Robert Stone
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Friday, Jan. 18, 2:30pm — Prospector Square Theatre, Park City] Any sacrifice here has been borne entirely by my wife and kids for tolerating my long hours and frequent absences. I think anybody who’s fortunate enough to get to make a movie, let alone get that movie into Sundance, would be hard pressed to frame that as a sacrifice — unless of course someone was harmed in the process. Sundance Responses 2013
