Sundance Diary: Day 7
Day 7 (Wednesday, Jan. 25):
Since I didn’t get to bed until nearly 3 a.m., I slept in a bit — all the way until 9! — and then went to the Yarrow to do some writing before the 11 a.m. screening. After writing for about 15 minutes, I fell asleep for a half-hour. Apparently, my prose is so dull, I fall asleep just WRITING it.
I kid, of course; my prose is lively and effervescent. But despite getting slightly more sleep last night than I had been, I was still one tired son of a gun. I was dragging all day, sometimes literally.
It was all I could do to stay awake during “Subject Two,” the 11 a.m. press screening. The film is a modern take on “Frankenstein,” with a hermitic doctor repeatedly killing and reviving his assistant in an attempt to discover immortality. That sounds bad, being murdered and resurrected by your boss, but really, I’ve had worse jobs.
Scott the Angry Jew and Erik Childress and I went to Burger King for lunch, where Scott pointed out our physical flaws and did an unflattering impersonation of Erik. You would sense the irony in this if you ever saw Scott or heard him speak.
I spent some time at Sundance headquarters after that, writing and gathering press kits and socializing and whatnot. Then it was back to the Yarrow for “Little Miss Sunshine,” the hit of the festival.
This film was purchased earlier in the week for $10 million. The only other Sundance film to be bought for that much was “Happy, Texas,” the 1999 comedy that went on to gross … less than $2 million. It was such a big Sundance hit, and the Weinsteins figured they could make a fortune off it, and then it tanked. A typical price for a Sundance hit is more like 2 or 3 million. I’m just sayin’.
Anyway, “Little Miss Sunshine” was a big hit with Sundance audiences in its public screenings, and now the press had a chance to see it, too. The screening was packed — it was this year’s “Hustle and Flow” or “Napoleon Dynamite” — and the room was too warm, but I believe most of us enjoyed the film.
It’s a comedy about angst and dysfunction in an Albuquerque family, one of those groups that puts the “querque” in “Albuquerque.” The son has taken a vow of silence, the little girl wants to be in beauty pageants, the uncle is gay and suicidal, the dad is a failed motivational speaker, and so forth. Steve Carell is the uncle, Greg Kinnear is the dad, Toni Collette is the mom. It’s funny stuff, overall, the kind of thing that could certainly have mass appeal if it’s marketed correctly (which I don’t think “Happy, Texas” was).
Next up: a press screening of “Right at Your Door,” a quasi-thriller set in Los Angeles on the day that terrorists have detonated a series of chemical bombs. Citizens are urged to stay inside and seal off their houses, which our hero finally does — and then his wife stumbles home, contaminated by the poison and highly contagious. If hubby lets her in, he’ll die, too. What’s a guy to do?
I liked the film if only for its successful portrayal of the panic and intensity that would surely follow such a disaster in real life. The first 20 minutes or so reminded me quite a bit of “24,” actually, which is a good thing. It doesn’t quite hold up, though, and it wound up reminding me of “Open Water” in that it involves a husband and wife in a stressful situation where the wife annoys me and I hope she gets eaten by a shark.
I had one more movie before I could call it a day and get some sleep, and it was a public screening at the Park City Racquet Club. Now, I don’t like this venue. It was added just last year, and I resent it because it’s not really “on the way” to anyplace, and so it screwed up all the shuttle-bus routes. (They’re still working out the kinks in the shuttle system, apparently: Each time I have gotten on the “Theater Loop” bus this week, it has taken a different route. It’s like the drivers are randomly deciding which order to take the stops.)
This was my first visit to the Racquet Club this year, and I was delighted to find they had introduced stadium seating! Bear in mind, the “theater” part of the venue is usually a basketball court. Everything Sundance-y is temporary. So making it stadium seating must have required an enormous amount of extra effort, and I applaud the festival organizers for doing it. Now if they can just get the bus drivers to quit improvising, they festival will be nearly perfect.
The movie was “A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints,” a slice-of-life coming-of-age drama set in Queens in 1986. It’s a good film, very artfully made, and it reminded me of “Raising Victor Vargas,” a Sundance entry from a few years ago that just as vividly and authentically recreated the streets of New York. It’s just like being there, only less smelly.
