The Sundance Film Festival Celebrates Cinema at its Best

The Sundance Film Festival, so named for its chairman Robert Redford’s movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, is held every January in and around Park City, Utah. This festival began in 1978 in order to attract more film makers to Utah and showcase American films and film-makers, its first name was the Utah/US Film Festival and it was held in September of each year in the metropolis of Salt Lak e City – the heart of Mormon country where beer and other alcoholic beverages are rarely permitted. However when director Sydney Pollack said they would reach more people, and probably have more fun, in a ski resort town at the height of ski season than in the off season, the festival switched to a January showcase at nearby Park City where snow bunnies are abundant and so are A-list celebrities.

Between then Governor Scott Matheson of Utah and Chairman Robert Redford, the two came up with several goals for the festival and that was to showcase American made films and to highlight the potential of independent filmmakers in addition to increasing the visibility of Utah as a movie making state. At this time, the main concerns with the film festival were a contest for independent American films, filmmaker panel discussions and to present a series of retrospective films or celebrate a single actor, producer or filmmakers achievements with a Frank Capra Award, Jimmy Stewart was the first year’s honorary recipient.

In 1982, documentary films received their own category and seemed to explode onto the scene with several entries from lesser known directors and producers. The film festival came into it’s own in its seventh year when the Cohen Brothers introduced their first film Blood Simple which garnered the Grand Jury Prize and Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise earned him a Special Jury Prize.

A non-profit organization, the Sundance Institute took over running the film festival in 1985 and during the 1991 celebration of films, it was officially renamed the Sundance Film Festival. Countless number of independent film makers have gotten their big break at Sundance, Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh, Edward Burns and Kevin Smith to name a few. Many of their films went on to see big box office success which might not have otherwise happened had it not been for the exposure at Sundance.

A few of the films that went on to enjoy widespread commercial success include Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, The Blair Witch Project, The Full Monty, Shine, American Splendor, and Soderbergh’s Sex, Lies and Videotape. Soderbergh was once a bus driver for the Sundance event, ferrying festival goers around Park City two years before he came back with his hit movie.

Approximately 200 feature films were screened during 1986 through 1988, including Woody Allen’s Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), an early Robin Williams attempt at dramatic acting in Seize the Day (1987) and Tim Hunter’s classic film staring a very young Keanu Reeves in River’s Edge and the John Water’s cult favorite Hairspray (1988).