Sundance Wrap-up

(If you want to read all my Sundance 2009 posts, click here and scroll down)

When I drove back home from Park City, it was the first time I saw Utah in the light. I don't know if the pictures quite capture it, but it really was beautiful.




Two other movies I would have liked to have seen while I was in town are I Love You Phillip Morris and Humpday.


In Phillip Morris, Jim Carrey plays a gay sociopath (OK, so maybe not the media attention we're looking for, but it does sound intriguing) with Ewan McGregor as his love interest. I read that there is a graphic sex scene in the first 10 minutes. And, interestingly enough, the film is described as a light and farcical dark comedy.

I actually really like Jim Carrey's repertoire outside of his Ace Ventura-esque comedies. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of my favorites, and The Truman Show is another one that easily makes my top ten.


Humpday is affectionately called a "bromance" film, where two straight dudes decide to make a gay porno. OK, so it sounds like cheap entertainment (not that there's anything wrong with that). There aren't any name actors in it and the pic from the movie that Sundance advertised on their site is awful (could it really be any worse? It's like a double mug shot). But it seemed to be one of the most talked about movies while I was there, and I am convinced that this must be a great movie - funny, great character depth, exploring the nuances of sexuality, etc. After I found out that it was directed by a woman, I was even more intrigued. I'm sure Sundance selected the film based on its original thematic elements, but if it really is just two dudes trying to go at it, then that's good enough for me. Even if they do look like they need a shower and a personality makeover. What can I say - I'm easy.

Sundance Day #4

Today was my last day in Park City. I started the day off by going to two panels at New Frontier - "Web Content - Where are the Big Ideas for Small Screens?" and "Meet the Sundance Filmmakers."



In the second panel, three different filmmakers showed clips from their movies and talked about them. One film in particular that I would have loved to have seen but it was sold out was the documentary We Live in Public, which went on to win the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for U.S. Documentary.


It was shot over a 10 year span of various people living their lives in front of the camera, and edited from over 5,000 hours of footage (doing the math, I figured that it would take you over 208 days, 24 hours a day, just to watch all the footage!). More than just exploitative reality entertainment, the film serves as a cautionary tale to the role that technology plays in our lives.

After that, I caught the last half of a panel at Queer Lounge called "Navigating Hollywood with GLBT Content." They showed the trailer for a new lifetime movie with Sigourney Weaver called Prayers for Bobby which is based on a true story of a gay rights crusader whose teenage son committed suicide due to her religious intolerance.


Despite the generic-feeling of the plot, I actually got teary eyed just from watching the trailer! (although I made sure that none of my fellow butches saw me)

After that, I went to a shorts screening at New Frontier called Lunch Films (not officially part of the Sundance programming - just an event that one of the Sundance lounges sponsored). The idea behind Lunch Films is basically that a filmmaker is taken out to lunch, and in return he/she makes a short film for the cost of the lunch. Rules and inspirations are written out on a napkin contract. I don't know if the films have to be experimental or not, but all of them were; a few were quite good, others were...I don't want to say horrible, but well - not that enjoyable. But I love the concept of Lunch Films, and that the founder spends his own money commissioning films on a budget. He tours around the country with his collection, screening it at various theaters.


That evening, I had two Sundance screenings to attend - a shorts program and Helen, a feature staring Ashley Judd, whose character deals with severe depression.


Although I can appreciate a good gut-wrenching movie, it just didn't grab me and pull me in the way I think it should have. I found the movie a little boring, like it was a one-note tune playing over and over (i.e. she's depressed and it sucks). However, during the Q&A I could tell that many people in the audience were very affected by it. It reminded me of the movie When a Man Loves a Woman where Meg Ryan plays an alcoholic, although I thought that movie was much more powerful.

Sundance and Slamdance - Day #3

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Sundance Day #2

I started the day off by seeing my first Sundance film - Amreeka. I decided to buy tickets because the director is a friend of a friend, although I had no idea what to expect. I knew it was about a mother and son who immigrate to America from Palestine, but I think that description doesn't do the film justice. I thought it was really excellent - very touching, at times funny, and very well written.

Here's the cast and crew during the Q&A -


This is the crowded lobby after the screening -


After that, I checked out a panel at Queer Lounge called "Short Films - Yes, there is a Market!" I already have a few short films in distribution and will probably continue to just focus on features, although I still thought the panel was interesting. My friend Roberta Maria Monroe was the moderator; she has a book that just came out called How NOT to Make a Short Film: Secrets from a Sundance Programmer


Afterward, Roberta and some other friends got me into the afterparty for a film at Slamdance (the alternative to Sundance that is a well-respected festival in its own right) called Weather Girl.



After that, we headed out for sushi again, and then back to Roberta's condo to chill for awhile. I joined her condo mates at the Queer Lounge kick-off party (even though they had already kicked-off two days earlier), then briefly hit up the party at the Filmmakers Lodge to get some complimentary hummus and pita before heading back to my condo.


I do feel lucky to have been able to get into so many of the parties there (it isn't always easy - it pays to have friends in high places), but I did find them a tad overrated. Not a whole lot of networking seemed to be going on, although I realize every party is different and I'll definitely do the rounds again when I go to Sundance again.

Sundance Day #1

To pick up where I left off in my last post -

I went to the box office to pick up my tickets I had bought online. It isn't always easy to buy tickets to the screenings at Sundance, but I think it helped that this year was a slow year (some people said it was the economy, others thought it was the inauguration).



I had a panel to go to about Avid file formats at 2:00, but I had a little bit of free time beforehand, so after I got my tickets and bought a souvenir T-shirt, I walked around and got the lay of the land.





Sundance has several different lodge-type spots where you can go in and relax, get warm, check your email, chat, etc., so I checked them out - the Sundance House, Filmmaker Lodge, and New Frontier. The Sundance House in conjunction with Brita and Filter for Good was giving away BPA-free refillable water bottles in an effort to reduce water bottle waste during the festival. I already had three of my own in my back pack (I drink a lot of water), but these were free and said "Sundance" on them so I picked one up. The best part was that there was free Brita water at all of the theaters and lodges; each lodge had its own mini cafe and none of them even sold bottled water. Since a reported 50,000 people go to Sundance every year (I read somewhere that this figure is 5 times as many as the amount of tourists who visit Park City the whole rest of the year), that's a lot of waste reduction. And hopefully people will continue to reuse their bottles after they get home.

The Filmmaker Lodge, despite the cool name, didn't have anything too exciting going on at the moment, so I headed over to New Frontier where the panel was going to be. The space was set up like a hybrid between a night club and a modern art museum. Colored lights lit the rooms (although the room with the panel was regularly lit), and video installations and interactive computer art lined the walls. They had plenty of couches to lounge around on while you waited for whatever you needed to wait for.




Despite the visually crazy club-like appearance, the video installations provided a soothing sound backdrop (something like birds and waves from what I remember), and it was actually a very relaxing and zen sort of place to hang out. It ended up being one of my favorite places to sit and recharge in between events.

After the Avid file format panel, I walked back down main street to Queer Lounge, which is a space open to the public to come in and chat, relax, check their email, etc. like the other lodges/lounges around town (the other lodges/lounges are actually only open to the public on a space available basis. I had bought a credential that would guarantee me access, however, it was slow enough this year that you didn't need one). Queer Lounge had the benefit of having a lot of queer people there, and like a couple of the other lounges, they also hosted daily panels and nightly parties.



That evening, I went to the "Thank GLAAD it's Friday" party at the lounge, which a friend of mine got me on the list for before arriving in town.

Here's a view of main street from the balcony -



It was really crowded inside and not totally conducive to talking to people.


After that, a group of us lesbos headed out for sushi.


After that, we finagled ourselves to be somebody's +1 for the film programmers party at the Filmmaker Lodge that night. I hung out with my lesbo friends, but was a little disappointed that there didn't seem to be a whole lot of networking going on.


At any rate, we stayed out late and had fun; it was an all around eventful day.

Sundance Day #0

As I wrote a couple of posts ago, I recently got back from my first trip to Sundance. Over the past few years, I've submitted two of my films to the festival - my short Half Laughing in addition to Butch Jamie, and while neither one of them got in, I still hope to someday go with one of my films. But in the interim, I thought it would be a good opportunity to go and check it out.

There was some talk about boycotting the festival since it's in Utah, and so much of the money in favor of prop 8 came from Utah. However, there seemed to be the general consensus among GLBT filmmakers that since Sundance has always supported us, at times when no one else would, it didn't seem right to take our support away from them. That and of course, we would only be hurting ourselves by not going and partaking in what Sundance had to offer.

Park City is about 700 miles from L.A., and I decided to drive in the interest of doing the trip as cheaply as possible. I had some friends driving up as well but they were staying two days longer than I had planned, so I made the trek by myself. It took over 11 hours to get there - longer than I've driven by myself before, and I felt it was quite an accomplishment. Here are some pics from the road -




That night, I arrived at the condo that I would be sharing with 7 or so people I hadn't yet met. I had secured a bunk bed for $85 a night via craigslist in a two bunk bed room with three other people. I never did spend much time at the condo and I didn't even meet all of the other people there, but the people I did talk to were all very nice and were volunteering for the festival. Sharing the room didn't turn out to be too bad, although next time I will definitely be bringing an eye mask and ear plugs.

The next morning I woke up, not quite in the swing of things. I laid in bed thinking to myself "Do I really have to get up? Do I really have to schlep myself and all my winter accessories, water bottles, local maps, and trail mix all over town to which I have no idea where I'm really going or what I'm really doing?" "Yes Michelle, you didn't spend all this money and drive across three states to lay in bed all day." So I got up.

I put on every single winter accessary I had brought and I walked outside completely bundled and ready for the worst. It was about 43 degrees and...really warm. I stripped off all of my accessories, unzipped my jacket, and walked a few minutes to the nearest shuttle stop. Since it was dark when I got into town the night before, it was the first time I could see how beautiful everything was.




At the shuttle stop, a festival representative asked me where I was going so he could get me on the right shuttle. I had a color coded map and was fully prepared to navigate myself around, but it was nice that there seemed to be people looking out for us.

After I got on the shuttle, I started to get excited; I could feel the energy of the people around me - we were at Sundance!