For the last couple of weeks, I‘ve been chewing over my experience at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. As one would expect, there was much written about the festival this year that focused on its status as the final edition to be held in Park City, and the first to be held after the death of its visionary founder. And on the ground in Park City, it was the most common conversation. “How do you feel about Sundance leaving Utah?”
Side-by-side with that question was another one that was hovering over the festivities, having to do with the health, or lack thereof, of the film business, or more specifically the indie film world that Sundance has been more or less synonymous with since its founding.
I found myself having tremendously mixed feelings. As a long-time participant, of course there was a sense of nostalgia that a chapter in my life was coming to an end. But there was a palpable backlash on the street to the entire concept of nostalgia. The old indie film business, as represented by Sundance was dead. The only focus should be on reinvention.
The folks who are running the festival are justifiably focused on the future, given that they have a major stake in the coming move to Boulder and in keeping the festival relevant, no matter the state of affairs in the industry. But above and beyond that obvious need, there was a certain dismissive aspect to the conversation. For me, the signature moment occurred at a “curated” event that was titled the “Future Models Salon,” which was kicked off by Indiewire Editor-in-Chief, Dana Harris-Bridson, with the declaration that “nostalgia is toxic.”
That remark really rubbed me the wrong way. Not only was it a direct attack on what I was feeling in the moment, but it also struck me as contemptuous. Anyone who has spent more than 40 years as part of a community can be forgiven for feeling nostalgic about having one last visit to the place where it all happened. What is truly toxic (although I wonder if that is too strong a word) is nostalgia for something that never was. And the press and much of the industry has been guilty of that for a very long time. Sundance was never what many people were led to believe it was.
Not that I’m in any sort of competition, but very few people can claim to having attended Sundance as long as I have. My first festival was in 1984, when it was still the U.S. Film and Video Festival, and sponsored by the Utah Film Commission. The town of Park City was just beginning to be built up. The Prospector Square area was under construction. The Deer Valley bypass road had yet to be built. There wasn’t a single traffic light in the town.
In those days, a small number of distributors and press were offered fully paid trips in return for appearing on a panel and perhaps attending a movie or two. From a business perspective, there was no reason to be there. Most of the films had already shown elsewhere and the focus of the festival was on regional filmmakers—not exactly what the marketplace was asking for at the time. The rap on Sundance films was that they were “granola movies.”
Since all the restaurants were closed by 9:00, there was no way to see a movie and also have dinner. It was one or the other. And during the day, there was the skiing. That was the main attraction of the festival—a fully paid trip to one of the best ski resorts in the world. In those early years, my ski days netted deep friendships with filmmakers, both above and below the line, as well as other distributors and some press people. Some of these folks became some of my closest friends over those years.
At the time, I was working for a company called Cinecom, and there was no expectation that I was there to do any business. It was just one of the perks of being an independent film distributor at a time when there weren’t many of us.
In the years that followed, through many personal incarnations, I kept receiving those invitations. I have no tally of exactly how many times I attended the festival, but let’s just say I missed very few of them. I watched as the festival slowly evolved into a larger event. You can imagine how disappointing it was when it reached the point where they stopped paying for us to come—the festival was now on the map as an important industry event. I was asked to serve on an advisory board that focused on some of the early logistical issues, such as getting the restaurants to stay open later.
Meanwhile, my career kept evolving as well. At various times, I participated at the festival as a distributor, a producer, a producer’s rep, a marketer, and at times, just an attendee. I bought and sold films at the festival. I participated in late night negotiations for hotly contested titles on both sides of the table. I made deals to get my films financed over a hot chocolate on Main Street. I was made fun of by a journalist who thought it was hilarious that I was using a cell phone. By the way, the cell service was terrible, and I had to memorize particular spots in town where I could get a signal.
In those early years, there were no official parties, but every year, Irwin Young of Du Art Laboratories in New York, would have a bash at the condo he had rented for the festival. Du Art was the film lab of choice for indie filmmakers, mostly because of Irwin’s generosity. So many of the Sundance films were processed there that there was a log jam at the lab to get them all in ready in time. Irwin’s annual party was attended by just about everyone who was there professionally, but most notably included the extended cast and crew of the films that were being shown. It was a truly egalitarian mix of people who were really committed to filmmaking. That party got so crowded over the years that it spilled out onto the snow-covered yards around the condo, no matter the weather.
As the festival continued to grow, in both size and perceived importance, the mythology around Sundance grew even faster. Post “sex lies and videotape,” the distributors were out in force. Post “Reservoir Dogs,” the agents and Hollywood producers moved in and completely commercialized Main Street. From that moment forward, until Covid sent things crashing down, the tug of war between the commercial interests and the “mission” of Sundance became the central story.
I bring all this up, not just to wallow in my personal nostalgia, but rather to point out that the Sundance myth was never a match for its reality. While there were particular years where a confluence of events would spark a robust acquisitions market for independent films, those years were rare. It was more common that one or two titles would sell at the festival, a few more would get distribution afterward, and the rest would languish. Even in the best years, Filmmaker Magazine’s yearly assessment of the success of Sundance titles would conclude that the majority of them had done very little business, and a few of them had been financial disasters. In other words, Sundance was always a lottery ticket, where the odds of winning were pretty small.
Another myth had to do with what constituted an “independent film.” One of the reasons I’m not a fan of that categorization is that it adds to the confusion. In the early years, some of the films that got attention, such as “Smooth Talk” or “Old Enough” or “Poison” or “Heat and Sunlight” were truly independent films that used the spotlight shone on them to launch careers—even if the commercial marketplace found them difficult for one reason or another. A $10 million production with three former SNL stars in it is not exactly in the same category. It’s easy to forget that even Sundance darlings like “sex lies and videotape” and “Reservoir Dogs,” came into the festival having been financed by large home video companies. So, were they independent? In fact, the go-go years of the home video bubble were the main reason there was a Sundance marketplace to begin with.
This mythology is what should really be called out as toxic. Generations of filmmakers have come to resent the feeling that Sundance is the province of a small group of powerful gatekeepers who control the marketplace. The press, the talent agents, the sales agents and the publicists have an interest in keeping the focus on the “business” rather than on the films. It’s their bread and butter. But as much as the festival has benefitted from the spotlight that comes from high profile deals, it has always been my impression that the folks who curate the festival are more driven by discovery. The door is wide open, but one can’t fault filmmakers for feeling like they can’t crack the inner circle. So, it is completely understandable that they would be demanding change.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am hardly adverse to change. In fact, throughout my career, I have sought out ways in which new technologies, new business models and changes in consumer behavior could be possible solutions to the ongoing instability of the market for independent films. While the holy grail of some kind of structural solution still intrigues me, I’ve seen too many examples of newfangled approaches that are just grabbing onto the latest fashionable jargon and trying to turn that into a “new business model.” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been pitched some brand-new way of approaching the indie film landscape only to point out the last time that very thing was done and why it never lived up to its promise. Is “Non-De” just a rebrand of what Julia Reichert did with her self-distribution of “Seeing Red” in 1983? She wrote a book about it called “Doing it Yourself.”
The point of all this is that looking toward the future with an eye toward shaking things up is all well and good but would have a greater chance of success if it also included understanding what’s happened before. What the prevailing wisdom about Sundance misses is that it propagates a largely false narrative in which there was ever a stabile indie marketplace. The good news is that throughout its history, the festival itself has always done what it was designed to do. It has offered up a platform to showcase work that was worthy of attention. The marketplace narrative was always layered on by others.
So, my Sundance this year was a chance to reflect on a little piece of my life. I’m not bemoaning the move to Boulder. It will be fun to explore a new version of Sundance. But I hope that the festival doesn’t leave behind its central reason for being. It’s too bad Irwin Young isn’t still around to sponsor a condo party so that hundreds of aspiring independent filmmakers can get to know each other and compare notes. That would be more useful than a curated “Future Models Salon.” See you in Boulder.