Sundance 2001: In Search Of The Next Big Thing
By Paul Fischer in Park City, Utah
Special to iofilm
19/01/2001

The cell phones blare in unison in theatre lobbies, buses and the mushy snowy sidewalks of Park City, Utah, scene of one of the most talked-about film festivals in the world. Nothing much changes: it’s all about trying to discover the next Shine or, heaven forbid, the next Blair Witch.

Here at Sundance, the stars, and the wannabes, are out in force. Publicists urge you to cover their film as if it is more precious than crude oil, others are happy to ignore you. For journalists, here in force, interviews are organised as rapidly as the personal publicists insist on cancelling them.

Yet, I've discovered on this annual cinematic pilgrimage to Park City, once you get past the hype and PR, there are some interesting films worthy of attention.

Tough love down South (America)

First up on today’s agenda was Barbet Schroeder’s extraordinary Our Lady of the Assassins. Based on a controversial novel by Fernando Vallejo, the film tells of a gay writer's (Gérman Jaramillo) return to his birthplace of Medellin in Colombia, after 30 years, only to find it has degenerated into the drug capital of the world: assaults, kidnapping, and random acts of violence are the norm.

Though he has come to die, he instead begins a relationship with Alexis (Anderson Ballesteros) a violent young man caught up in the gang warfare that touches every life in Medellin. Although the two could not be more different, Fernando and Alexis learn from the other's experience as they negotiate the violent streets, discovering through the horror the essential richness of life itself.

Our Lady of the Assassins is a film which is both disturbing, poignant and emotionally rich. It is also a film that explores violence as a means of youthful survival. Beautiful performances and Schroeder’s remarkable direction on location in his homeland, make Our Lady a powerful and confronting movie experience.

Face Time

It was time to move on to interviews. At least theoretically. After two cancellations, it was good to catch up with Aussie director Rob Sitch, in town for the US launch of The Dish. Rob said that, unlike his first experience with The Castle here (“We expected nothing”}, he was able to relax and do some interviews prior to the US release of the film in March.

I also bumped into director Kasi Lemmons working on a new film, The Caveman’s Valentine, a surreal Gothic thriller that sounds every bit as challenging as her stunning debut, Eve’s Bayou.

Diary of Three Women

Back to the movies and a curious oddity, Women in Film, from novelist and filmmaker Bruce Wagner. Using a video diary format, Wagner takes you into the lives and minds of three women, desperate for a seat at the filmmaking table. Their stories overlap in a variety of ways: Phyllis (Beverly D'Angelo), a sharp-tongued, onetime successful producer is desperately trying to flog her troubled film project. The second is Sara (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) a casting director spurred on by the birth of her blind baby boy while suffering the strains of a failing marriage. Her story, told through letters to her child and personal letters to her friend Holly Hunter, reveals her desperate need to get back into the thick of things. And then there is Gina (played by Aussie Portia de Rossi), an edgy actress and professional masseuse who "steals" energy from her celebrity clients. She is obsessed with the delusion that Darren Starr stole her ideas for his hit TV shows and is determined to draw him "into my web" for retribution.

While non-linear cinema can be refreshing, it needs to be compelling, and Women in Film tends to be repetitive and often highly pretentious. Yet it does contain at least two compelling performances by D’Angelo and a brazen de Rossi, who bury themselves into a complex female psyche. While the film is marginally interesting, these two women are film are so fascinating to watch, that one feels that they’ve survived the mish mash script they have to contend with.

For Those About To Rock

On the other end of the spectrum is the delirious documentary, We Sold Our Souls for Rock 'n Roll which chronicles the 30-city Ozz Fest tour, a heavy metal extravaganza, with performances from Black Sabbath, Rob Zombie, Slipknot, Godsmack, and Slayer. The tour is a spectacle brilliantly conceived by Sharon Osbourne, wife of Black Sabbath lead singer Ozzie Osbourne and matriarch of the festivity.

While not exactly a Black Sabbath fan, the fun with this raucous film from director Penelope Spheeris, is seeing the kind of outlandish impact Black Sabbath has on new generations of fans. Performing for three decades, nothing much changes and the crowds are as bizarre as the musical acts. What a perfect way to end day 1 at Sundance.

Tomorrow I get to do it all over again.

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