Springtime In The Snow

 Sundance Bound

by David Kleiler

With the chilly winds of New England and the never-ending snow of Park City, it is not hard to yearn for the arrival of spring. But for the independent filmmaker, the Sundance film festival does mark the beginning of spring.

For both those who are accepted and for those who are rejected, Sundance signals a fresh phase of a project, which has just been completed. For most of the few fortunate participants, Sundance is the beginning of the quest for a distributor. For the many that have been rejected, it is the start of a new festival and marketing strategy. For almost everyone such strategies had been on hold until the Sundance selections were announced.

As there has been for the past decade, some of the participants are from New England. For six straight years, a New England based film is in narrative competition, this year that film is LIFT, by DeMane Davis and Khiri Streeter, whose last film, the powerful, BLACK AND WHITE AND RED ALL OVER, was in the 1997 Sundance Film Festival. A product of the Sundance Screenwriting Lab, LIFT deals with a dysfunctional Boston black family who specializes in shoplifting. Actually, the film is also a reaction to those African-American films that embrace bourgeois materialism. Picture Park's Mark Hankey is one of the producers and Kevin Fennessey supported the casting. There must be high hopes for the film since all four Park City screenings are in large venues.

Also from New England is the Maine shot IN THE BEDROOM with Sissy Spacek, Tom Wilkenson, and Marisa Tomei. A drama about the inner workings of an upper middle-class "waspish" family, it is the first film directed by Todd Field, primarily known as an actor (RUBY IN PARADISE, EYES WIDE SHUT), who has also worked on short films with Matthew Moline and Plymouth actor Philip Forman. Cambridge's Mary Feuer (FLOATING) was production manager on the film. By contract that stipulated that 90% of the technical crew came from New England. Locals Shannon Diilloway (now at Central Booking) Evans Brown, Tyris Smith, and Dave Cambria also worked on the film. Now bi-coastal, Mary has just finished producing Barstow 2008, a film about an attempt to compete for the Summer Olympics which stars Christy Scott-Cashman (NIGHT DEPOSIT) who herself has completed Brad Jacques directed SERIAL INTENTIONS.

There are also two documentaries in competition. Northern Lights veteran filmmaker Bestor Cram, in collaboration with Mike Majoras have made AN UNFINISHED SYMPHONY, a reflection on the still controversial Vietnam War. Using actual footage, the film goes back to the 1971 Vietnam Veteran's Against the War, a 3-day protest on Memorial Day Weekend for which Cram was one of the organizers. The protest reverses the path of Paul Reverie's famed ride of 1775. John Kerry and Howard Zinn are featured in the film, which promises to be a powerful experience.

Also powerful and moving (it's the only one of the four that I have seen) is Kate Davis' SOUTHERN COMFORT, a rich humanistic portrait of three transgendered couples in rural Georgia (Ironically Bestor Cram had also explored this subject in his documentary YOU DON'T KNOW DICK). SOUTHERN COMFORT is also a love story. Although the film is shot in the South and Davis lives in Manhattan, she grew up in Belmont, summered in Falmouth, studied filmmaking at Harvard with Ross McEwlee, made the acclaimed GIRLTALK about three teenage strippers in Boston's Combat Zone and co-founded with Judy Laster the Woods Hole Film Festival. Davis' film is the exception to the festival's new springtime beginning, for her film has already been bought by HBO and is scheduled to premiere at New York's prestigious Film Forum in late February.

Also at Sundance, Lexington raised and Harvard Business School graduate, Robin Alper, will have the world premiere of Allison Anders THINGS BEHIND THE SUN. Starring Eric Stoltz, Elizabeth Pena, and Rosannna Arquette, which Alper produced. Brookline raised Albert Maysles (GIMME SHELTER) will be represented by LALEE'S KIN: THE LEGACY OF COTTON. Finally, Radcliff trained Stockard Channing appears IN THE BUSINESS OF STRANGERS with Julia Stiles

For the other contestants, it is the beginning of the exhausting process of getting their films sold. And for those who were rejected it is the beginning of a whole new strategy. Rick Moses' quietly moving ORPHANS is applying for every regional festival, Mark Wilkenson's DISCHORD, whish was shot on Cape Cod, is hoping for Rotterdam and Berlin, while Rex Dean's SPACE BABY AND MENTAL MAN team are defining a strategy for their wonderful, but hard to classify film. On the other hand, short films rejects Alice Stone (EXPIRED) and Monika Mitchell (WITNESS) have already gotten offers.

For the results, look for coverage of the Festival in the March issue of Imagine.

Think spring!