Sundance Responses
-
“CODEPENDENT LESBIAN SPACE ALIEN SEEKS SAME” | co-writer-director, Madeleine Olnek
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 11:30 pm — Library Center Theatre] My biggest surprise was the miracle of locations we were able to shoot in for free in our “no budget” New York City movie. They were of course all simultaneously open for business, and part of shooting in this vein means that you have to be willing to work in a stop-and-start fashion. First we had asked if we could shoot a day in the stationery store. Then that day turned into two, three, five, seven days… They always said yes, and it always surprised me. Especially after some […]
-
“THE DETAILS” | writer-director, Jacob Aaron Estes
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 6:15 pm — Eccles Theatre] The surprises began during the initial writing process. I started typing the script not knowing where it was going — not at all in fact. I was just following impulses. Characters emerged from the ether that I did not expect, and a plot emerged without forethought — at least not the kind of structured forethought of an outline or the weeks of pondering and planning that I so often engage in before I begin to write scenes. Truthfully, I had no idea that the keys I was hitting would turn […]
-
“MAD BASTARDS” | co-writer-director, Brendan Fletcher
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 6:00 pm — Egyptian Theatre] The biggest surprise for me in making this movie is the emotional power of the finished product. As someone with a strong documentary background, making this movie opened my eyes to how powerful the dramatic narrative arc can be when you get it right. We took so many risks on so many levels that I guess I’m still amazed that all the pieces have come together and that the end result gels so beautifully with the music. The performances are a big part of this too — they’re really raw […]
-
“GUN HILL ROAD” | writer-director, Rashaad Ernesto Green
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 5:30 pm — Library Center Theatre] The biggest surprise for me was how hard it was to cast the role of Michael. During the months of writing and toiling over every beat, I never imagined that the success of our film would come down to finding a miracle child who would wow audiences the world over. Gun Hill Road is the story of a Latino father who returns home after three years in prison to discover his teenage child Michael exploring sexual identity and an alternative lifestyle in ways he can’t possibly comprehend. Casting the other two […]
-
“KINYARWANDA” | writer-director, Alrick Brown
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 9:00 pm — Egyptian Theatre] One of the biggest surprises while shooting Kinyarwanda on location in Rwanda is something that we may have just taken for granted. Frankly, it could have been a surprise in the U.S., in a community not familiar with low-budget or independent filmmaking. The community, many of our crew, and local officials seemed to have a really strong grasp of the work of big budget films — situations where, as a solution, money is often thrown at a problem. Many were also very familiar with the other extreme: people picking up […]
-
“TAKE SHELTER” | writer-director, Jeff Nichols
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 3:00 pm — Eccles Theatre] The biggest surprise associated with the making of Take Shelter was, without question, Jessica Chastain. When traveling the festival circuit with my first film, Shotgun Stories, I was fairly outspoken about the fact that Michael Shannon is one of the greatest actors working today. When casting Take Shelter, a film that is anchored by the relationship of a married couple, the biggest question I had was: “What actress could go toe-to-toe with Michael Shannon?” Then the universe delivered me Jessica Chastain. When thinking about this role my executive producer, Sarah […]
-
“HOT COFFEE” | director, Susan Saladoff
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 12:00 pm — Temple Theatre] As a first-time filmmaker, being accepted into the U.S. Documentary Competition at Sundance was obviously the biggest surprise. But what was also a huge surprise was going back to read the outline that I wrote in the summer of 2008 when Hot Coffee was just a dream. After finishing the film in the summer of 2010, I reread my original outline and to my great surprise realized that the final version of the film was almost exactly what I had laid out in the outline, despite having not gone back […]
-
“ANOTHER EARTH” | co-writer-director, Mike Cahill
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 12:15 pm — Eccles Theatre] The biggest surprise is how the movie began, and how it ended. We started with no money, a basic treatment and a Sony EX3. I didn’t really care about getting all my ducks in a row before starting. We just started. Brit Marling, Morgan Marling (her sister), Liang (my friend from China) and I went to Connecticut where I grew up and we set out to make this epic indie minimalist science fiction drama. On the first day, Brit came back from a run in the morning and told us […]
-
“RESURRECT DEAD: THE MYSTERY OF THE TOYNBEE TILES” | director, Jon Foy
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Monday, Jan. 24, 3:00 pm — Holiday Village Cinema IV] Admittedly the decision to make my movie was based on an absurd gamble. I dropped out of school and moved to another town in an attempt to solve a bizarre and obscure two-decade old mystery. Once relocated, this sober reality began to set in. What if we never find anything? What if we turn up an answer too quickly? Or if the story is lackluster? What on Earth was I even expecting to find? But, to my astonishment, the investigation began taking off. And suddenly the world felt […]
-
“CEDAR RAPIDS” | director, Miguel Arteta
[PREMIERE SCREENING: Sunday, Jan. 23, 9:45 pm — Eccles Theatre] The biggest and most exciting surprise about making Cedar Rapids was how beautifully our well-known cast blended in with our lesser-known cast. The film is about the unlikely friendship between four insurance agents at an annual convention. Three of the actors are well-known to the public — Ed Helms, John C. Reilly and Anne Heche — and the fourth is an amazing character actor from New York, Isiah Whitlock Jr. Although Isiah is known for his great performance as Senator Clay Davis in the TV series The Wire and his […]
