Sundance starts up again this week, and I'll be there to cover the highlights with a group of my students. In preparation, here's a list of some of the greatest Sundance hits since the festival got its improbable start in the snowy mountains of the cozy resort town of Park City, Utah. (I'm updating a list I posted last time I went to Sundance in 2009).
Sundance really hit its stride in 1985. Before that it was called the Utah/US Film Festival and hadn’t yet been sponsored by Robert Redford and the Sundance Institute. In 1985 it got a new name and gave the world an introduction to two of the country's most prolific and exciting filmmaking teams. Jim Jarmusch brought his second feature (following his largely unheralded debut film Permanent Vacation), and introduced the world to his own peculiar take on America in Stranger than Paradise.
This article appears in Jan 13-19, 2011.