Utah has ties to half a dozen festival films at Sundance
Those "others" just happen to include "Napoleon Dynamite" filmmaker Jared Hess and "In the Company of Men" director Neil LaBute, both of whom attended Brigham Young University.
So, local filmmakers are mindful of lasting effects Sundance success can have on a career. There are a half-dozen films this year — four features and two short films — with connections to Utah.
They not only include "The Guitar," from former Ogden resident Amy Redford (and daughter of Sundance Institute head honcho Robert Redford), but also Jed Cowley, a BYU graduate who is showing his short film, "The Loss of a Wrestling Match," at Sundance this year.
Cowley, who's now in a master's program at Columbia University, was ecstatic when he found out his film had been accepted into the festival.
"I couldn't believe it. I couldn't sit down or do anything else I was so excited and amazed," he recalled.
One filmmaker who comes to Park City with previous festival experience is Oren Peli, who lived in Salt Lake City for four years after emigrating from Israel in the early '90s. The competing Slamdance festival is screening his "Paranormal Activity," a supernatural thriller about a couple that believes their home may be haunted.
"Paranormal Activity" has already played in a couple of horror-related film festivals and has been building strong word of mouth. "Hopefully, we'll keep building an audience and scaring people along the way. That's the goal," he said by telephone from San Diego.
Peli is aware that both Hess and Nolan actually had films in Slamdance before they arrived at Sundance, saying that "it is an honor to have my film play at Slamdance."
And Peli is excited to see some old friends during his weeklong Utah stay, "especially since it's expensive to stay in Park City during the festival. I'm hoping to crash with a few people," he said, with a laugh.
Utah itself is featured in the Sundance selection "Adventures of Power." The air-drumming comedy was shot in Salt Lake City and Helper, and there are several recognizable landmarks, such as a power plant that was "crucial," according to the film's writer, director and star, Ari Gold.
"You wouldn't believe how much work we had to do just to find one plant that would let us shoot there," Gold said from Burbank, Calif.
You can be the first to comment on this story.