sundance 15.5 | the blizzard

For those of us who stayed until the bitter end at Sundance this year, getting out of town was a real adventure on Monday. Here's a few minutes of footage from I-80 yesterday afternoon, shortly before the highway was completely closed to traffic. While some of us made it through to Salt Lake City (and eventually got home safely), other attendees were stuck in Park City amidst 22" of new snow...



sundance 15.3 | open

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At the Sundance Film Festival's opening press conference in Park City on Thursday afternoon, covered earlier in indieWIRE.
[iphone photo by eugene hernandez]



sundance 15.2 | it's snow-time

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Our first view of the festival on Tuesday afternoon, when an at times intense, surprise snowstorm caught visitors and locals alike by surprise. The photo can't quite capture the striking chill in the air . Weather.com says the temperature will hit 4 degrees tonight, with a high of 13 tomorrow and a low of 3 tomorrow night.

Anyway, we used a cropped version of this image atop Steve Rosen's indieWIRE article about Sundance buzz tonight. Meanwhile, folks have been buzzing about yesterday's pre-fest dispatch, noting that some 100 new films will be vying for U.S. distribution at Sundance this year.



sundance 15.1 | baggage

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Arriving at SLC this morning, I got that Sundance feeling immediately upon hitting the baggage claim area. Granted I am rather nostalgic this year, it being my 15th Sundance and all, but I still remember the excitement of landing at SLC the day after Inauguration Day '93. For me the festival began at that spot. A small group of us who had decided to attend Sundance knowing no one, with no real connection to the indie community, met Marco Mueller from the Locarno festival (now head of Venice) and he gave us a ride to Park City after we realized the festival was nowhere near the airport.

It all began at Sundance '93 where Tim LaTorre and I met Mark Rabinowitz, and got to know a few filmmakers including Robert Rodriguez, Bryan Singer, Rob Weiss, Koina Freeman. I found myself inspired by John Pierson's panel discussion featuring a bunch of 20-something filmmakers, and we'd enlist the help of some of them when we eventually launched iLINE on AOL. [The New York Times archive offers an entertaining take on Sundance '93, when the feetival drew 5,000 attendees. A friend the other day told me she read the this year's fest would draw 45,000 people.]

One more memory: Anticipating Morgan Spurlock's new film this year, I just remembered that the SLC baggage claim is where I first met him back in 2002. Having seen "Super Size Me" prior to the festival, I think I startled him by confronting him with a congratulations for his great work on a film no one was supposed to have seen yet. We profiled Spurlock later in the week and I can't wait to see his new film this year.
[iphone photo by eugene hernandez]



"true lies"

trueliesgnn.jpgThis will be the first in a regular series of posts related to Sundance '06...

Starting to research the films a bit I've found the first one I am really intrigued by. Its called "American Blackout" and its by Ian Inaba of Guerrilla News Network (I blogged about Ian's Eminem video "Mosh" more than a year ago). GNN says the film "follows the career of Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and investigates the current tactics used to control our democratic process and silence political dissent."

Most tantalizing is a clip called "True Lies" (named after the book upon which the doc seems to be based) which they've posted on their site. The bit features poet Taalam Acey ("If GNN produced 60 minutes, Taalam Acey would be our Andy Rooney", pictured right) and includes music from "The Soulsavers" and animation by Haik Hoisington. Check out the clip and tell me you aren't intrigued...