Sundance Day 1: Indie Film Organizes to Stop the Merger Era
Plus: My first screenings — including a new movie with Chris Pine and Jenny Slate — were a reminder of what makes the fest so special
To celebrate the final Sundance Film Festival in Park City, I’ll be sending daily dispatches from the snow-covered mountains now through Sunday. Yesterday, I laid out the stakes for this year’s fest. Reach out to me if you’re on the ground: richard@theankler.com.
I have some news below about an independent film initiative coalescing at Sundance — announced at one of the events I was part of yesterday — aimed at fighting consolidation through regulatory channels, well beyond just Netflix and Warner Bros. You’ll want to learn about it and share your horror stories with them, I guarantee it.
But first…
Thursday began with the final moments of peace before the madness erupted. I enjoyed my last ride on a nearly empty shuttle bus — it occurred to me that it’s the last one I’ll ever enjoy in Park City.
On the other end of the spectrum, walking in the still quiet morning, the logo of Burger King taunted me, as we both know exactly how many meals I will end up eating there. (Answer: All of them.)
When I first came to Sundance, back when I wore a younger man’s clothes, the Burger King sign would have carried no fear for me. But over the years, we shed our illusions, and I know that between racing from event to event and the massive lines at literally everywhere else, the choice will soon be Burger King or starvation.
Rebels Take on the M&A Death Star
Thursday morning, I moderated a panel at the bustling Impact Lounge featuring three representatives of the Film Future Coalition: Executive director Jax Deluca and board members Barbara Twist and Brian Newman.
Film Future has taken on the role of advocating for the larger interests of the independent film community. Indie film has desperately needed someone in this role. As with many communities that define themselves on the margins of a larger industry, indie discourse tends to ignore or shrug at the larger issues roiling its fortunes and focus on fighting with itself.
There has been a “Render unto Caesar” attitude towards the big issues of the entertainment business, which has been aggravated by the fact, as Brian Newman explained, that for the past decade or so, many in the indie world have seen the studios as their saviors — particularly when the streamers were snatching up bucketfuls of Sundance films. Never mind that many of those acquisitions disappeared into the maw of the giant services with little to no promotion, never to be heard from again. As the traditional Hollywood indie sector crumbled and retreated, they grabbed at the tenuous lifeline thrown out by the streamers as though it was that or drown.
The Film Future Coalition, my panelists explained, aims to turn this desperate dependency around, and to that end, they have launched a new initiative that goes right at the heart of everything wrong with the larger industry today.