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Let’s Dance Once more – The fortieth Sundance Movie Competition Returns to Utah
by Alex Billington
January 21, 2024
As I settled into my first few screenings at Sundance, I am overwhelmed by the feelings and reminiscences and emotions I’ve had about this pageant. I have been attending for 18 years – fairly a very long time contemplating I began this weblog once I was solely 20. It was a complete totally different pageant again in 2007, my very first yr, and far has modified since then. Sundance is celebrating its fortieth Anniversary this yr – a lot has modified because it first began as effectively. Sundance was based in 1978 as the US Movie Competition (aka Utah/US Movie Fest), began by Robert Redford and his firm. The title was switched to Sundance in 1984, and that is the date they’ve chosen to designate this because the fortieth anniversary. Whereas the pageant has been evolving and adapting and updating, there’s one factor that has stayed the identical in spite of everything these years – the movies. I spend cash yr after yr to fly over to Utah and attend Sundance as a result of it is actually all in regards to the movies. Good or unhealthy, massive or small, there’s all the time an incredible wealth of should see movies at Sundance yr after yr after yr.
Pondering again over the previous 18 years of Sundance, a lot of my life is related to this pageant. The primary few years I attended, I might drive from Colorado to Salt Lake Metropolis and crash on my brother’s sofa. Later I used to be splitting condos with many blogger pals – Peter from SlashFilm, Neil from Movie College Rejects, Erik from Fandango, and lots of others – which was a complete loopy enjoyable period of its personal. I’ll always remember the evening I watched Name Me By Your Identify on the premiere at Sundance 2017. I got here out of that screening excessive on cinema, actually dancing by way of the streets to a close-by restaurant, the place I then chatted with a good friend for an hour about how good it’s. I’ll always remember the viewers going wild on the finish of the world premiere of 500 Days of Summer season at Sundance 2009 a few years in the past. I additionally bear in mind assembly and interviewing Luc Besson at my very first Sundance in 2007, which was a formative second for me as a result of The Fifth Factor is one in every of my all-time favourite motion pictures, and I took the interview (he was there for his movie Angel-A) for that purpose alone. Primarily to satisfy him & spend a little bit of time chatting with him (you’ll be able to nonetheless learn that interview).
In celebration of its fortieth Anniversary, Sundance revealed a Prime 10 checklist of their all-time greatest movies as chosen by a choice of 500+ filmmakers, critics (myself included), and different business members. None of my Prime 10 picks made the ultimate checklist, however that is okay! It is nonetheless a fantastic checklist of some improbable, unforgettable Sundance premieres. Whereas Kevin Smith’s Clerks and Myrick & Sánchez’s The Blair Witch Undertaking did not make the minimize both, that does not imply they don’t seem to be memorable – clearly they’re iconic movies from Sundance’s esteemed historical past. Additionally they supplied a listing of over 4000 movies that performed at Sundance over its 40 years, and looking by way of it’s overwhelming seeing how a lot got here out of this pageant. Sundance is named the launching floor for a lot of filmmakers – it is really a pageant of discovery, a spot to showcase new work, new voices, new concepts. Even experimental ideas – not every little thing will work and that is nice. The Safdie Brothers’ movie Daddy Longlegs was closely panned when it premiered at Sundance in 2010, however they went on to have an illustrious profession anyway. Not even movie must be a breakout hit to have an affect on cinema anyway.
This is the ultimate checklist of Sundance’s Prime 10 Movies of All-Time in line with the assorted individuals who submitted:
And here is my very own checklist of my favourite Sundance movies that I submitted as my picks for this anniversary checklist:
I am glad to be again at Sundance, and I hope the pageant continues to evolve. It appears to have outgrown itself once more – plenty of traditional venues are gone for good, and the few theaters that also stay in Park Metropolis are overcrowded, with some folks even being turned away. Everybody appears to solely come to Park Metropolis for the opening weekend of Sundance, and never many are left through the second half. I all the time keep till the top, I can not miss all these good movies! It was once the norm for most of the movie bloggers again within the day. We would all the time keep all 10 days, and the “Closing Night time” celebration was once a particular second on the finish of all of it to get collectively and shake off the pageant. These days, it appears everybody can solely afford the price of attending for the primary few days, nevertheless it’s additionally extra exhausting than ever. There’s all the time extra movies to see, however the schedule and the crowds make it a taxing effort to go from one-to-the-next, catching buses downtown to Predominant Avenue and again. I want we might all stick it out till the very finish, nevertheless it’s getting tougher & tougher to do ever yr.
Nonetheless, Sundance is flying and the movies are lighting up the screens. I’ve witnessed a number of massive standing ovations already, which is an efficient signal Sundance has programmed some genuinely unbelievable movies. It is essentially the most riveting and thrilling expertise to observe movies with these audiences, 1000 of us all collectively at Eccles, looking at one display. Laughing, crying, cheering, clapping, gasping collectively because the movie unfurls in entrance of us. Recollections from a few years at Sundance have been all in regards to the folks right here. And I’ll hold saying it, yr after yr, that I come again to Sundance for the folks and for the movies. They’re what carry me again. That is the movie neighborhood, the Sundance neighborhood, that retains the fest going. That is the true spirit of the pageant. It is not the events, it isn’t the celebrities, it is this celebration of cinema, this pleasure of discovery, this pleasure of the ability of storytelling. Now for some sleep earlier than I get up shiny & early for my subsequent movie.
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