PopSmart

(A firsthand account of the films, celebrities, snow and occasional Mormons that compose the greatest film festival in the world … or that we’ve been to so far.)

INT. — SALT LAKE CITY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT — MORNING

I’m leaving finally. I get to return to my bed, Varsity hamburgers and as much bumper-to-bumper traffic as any man could want. After three days of updates, I decided there was nothing worth telling until the end. The Sundance Film Festival is a marathon, not a sprint. When tackling the beast it’s important not to get burned out.

Had I gotten a media pass (wink wink, Ed, just kidding), there might be more to share. For the causal movie-goer, the festival itself is relentless. There is no end to the screenings, discussions, presentations, panels and stargazing. It really is amazing, and it engulfs two cities. It swallowed me whole by Wednesday. I needed a break after four consecutive days of waiting in line, sitting through panels and just a general lack of naptime. Reporters are like bats. We’re mostly blind and sleep for days.

So I chose to gamble in my downtime. Wendover is a small community of casinos and fast-food restaurants just across the Nevada boarder. With sin just about an hour-and-a-half away, I chose to go blow my rent money. I actually came away with about $168 bucks, most of which I spent on souvenirs — one being a poster I just realized I lost.

But I didn’t come to Utah for posters. Even ones that regrettably cost me $12.50. No, I came to experience Sundance and I think I did just that. Did I see any celebrities? Not really. It’s harder than you might think. I was in Park City three full days and I saw more deer than I did celebs. I suspect some of the edge of the week was off after the death of Heath Ledger. I tried walking around in circles for hours and all I seemed to find were thousands of people doing the same exact thing.

There was a moment I was sure I saw David Duchovny coming out of an American Apparel, but he doesn’t seem like a man who wears tights and I’m pretty sure he’s shooting the X-Files sequel.

Ledger’s death seemed to suck the life out of everything, but the hustle and bustle moved on. A small mountain town became a hotbed of the rich and famous and various media groups. At any point you could see three to five film crews doing anything from man on the street interviews to just general B-roll shooting. It was a spectacle.

If you come, come for the film. I think my sampling was good. In all, I saw seven films and a variety of short films. My favorite of the week was easily Absurdistan. I found that most of the screenings in Salt Lake City came with introductions or Q&A sessions with the cast and director. Viet Helmer, Absurdistan’s director, was one of the best. He introduced his film and let his cast answer questions at the end. There was nothing particularly memorable about these sessions, but it gave the experience some depth and a better connection with the film.

Sadly, Helmer got no credit at the awards ceremony, but an old enemy did. Ballast received the Directing Award in the Dramatic category and a nod for Excellence in Cinematography. A list of all the winners can be found here.

I completely agree with the latter of Ballast’s two awards, but the appeal of the film escapes me. I can only imagine that Lance Hammer’s use of a non-actor cast gives him some cred for the Directing Award, but the movie was a painful experience for me. I’ve never had my skin peeled off my arm like a banana, but I think the two experiences are similar.

But that’s what Sundance is for. It’s a chance to experience some of the best films in the world. And there are greatly differing ideas of what those films should be like. Ballast just happened to be the orange marshmallow shaped like a peanut in my bag of Halloween candy.

My week was spent looking forward to one experience and one experience alone: watching Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden? I had to see this movie, even if it meant breaking friends, smuggling nuclear weapons and whining very, very loudly.

The time came on Friday. I had already missed out on tickets for three other screenings and seen two wait-list lines of 100-plus for this film. There was a good chance it would be hideous, but I didn’t care. As I said before, it has become my white whale.

The final screening I found was at the Broadway Theater in Salt Lake City. I thought there were only two venues in the city, but I was wrong. The Broadway was like any other all-American theater. While juggling three screens for Sundance viewings, Broadway was also showing Atonement, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. So I figured if I couldn’t get into Where in the World, I had something to fall back on.

The screening was at 10:30 p.m. Wait-list tickets would be handed out at 8:30 p.m., so naturally I made my friends arrive at 7:15. That may seem silly, but 30 others had arrived by 7:45. My favorite was a younger Russian woman in town for a trade convention. She sold granola bars. She was No. 6. My group and I took No. 1 through No. 5 and my friend Johnathan got a free volunteer ticket.

I was happy to see a wait-list line free of drama. There had to be at least 80 people waiting for tickets by 8:29. We took our passes and went down the street for a beer. By this point in the week, I had accepted a variety of Utah quirks. For one, beer memberships really weren’t as bad as I first thought. A temporary membership was good for three weeks, so really it was like paying one cover charge for the year. A weekend in Buckhead can bankrupt me, so this was a welcome change.

Also, Mormon bashing was ever present. Salt Lake City has the highest non-Mormon population in the state, kind of like how Atlanta is a little blue, liberal dot in the center of Georgia. I made my own jokes, but slowly I started to figure something out. As crazy as Joseph Smith and Brigham Young were — and they were crazy — religion in general is all really the same. Crazy is relative.

Mormons aren’t bad people. They’re actually clean and nice. Their laws do piss me off. Like bars aren’t allowed to be zoned in together. Places like Little Five Points or Virginia-Highland would seem like Dodge City to Mormons. It’s a funny climate for one of the world’s great film festivals — one full of inspirational art and a great horde of people who you’d imagine would want to drink like a Kennedy.

But the community loves its film, and this year Where in the World seemed to be drawing them out in droves. We got back around 10 sharp, to get in line for the wait-list tickets. About 10:10 my friend Johnathan gave me his volunteer ticket and told me to go in and grab seats for everyone. I was thankful because at the very least it assured me that I would get us a good spot.

As it ended up, it only assured me a spot in the theater. By 10:20, the screening was full. Of the 80-plus people in line for the screening, only two wait-listers got in. Both were my friends, the others — including my friend Johnathan — took off. Wish good karma on him. I did the customary “Do you want me to come out?” that happens in these situations, but since I had talked about the film for a solid week, Johnathan hung up on me twice, giving me a quick “No.”

This act of kindness assures him of 1,000 virgins in heaven I think. The anticipation was killing me. I am a big fan of Morgan Spurlock’s last film, Super Size Me. My hope was that this would be better. The result was somewhere in between (see the review).

Everyone seemed to enjoy the movie, but the icing on the cake came afterward. Spurlock dropped in for a Q&A with the audience. Most questions were geared toward the film’s ending. Spurlock (SPOILER WARNING) didn’t actually find Osama as you might have guessed, but he seemed to learn a lot about America’s place in the world today. In general, people wanted to know about the most dangerous sequences in the film, the interviews and how the cameraman got everyone to smile — including radical Muslim leaders. It was interesting, but I had a question of my own. I didn’t want to get the audience-tilted response. I wanted to look the horse in the mouth, so I snuck up following the Q&A.

ME: Good film, but I had a quick question … (Reaches for handshake)

SPURLOCK: Ah, sure, but wait … can’t touch you. (Jumps back like I have leprosy) I’m sick. You don’t want this. (Gives me a manly elbow, like I just hit a walk-off homer.)
ME: (Me awkwardly elbowing him back) I’m sure the weather helps that.

SPURLOCK: Yeah, not at all. The altitude is a pain in the ass, too.

ME: Sure, I bet. Well, yeah. I wanted to know what the impression of the U.S. troops in Afghanistan was. Your film raised some good points about the environment of the Middle East and how Osama can have the power he does, but do they really think we’ll ever actually find him or is he dead?

SPURLOCK: Actually, for the most part, they think he’s dead. Or at the very least they don’t think we’ll find him.

ME: Great. Well, I’m glad you tried.

We took a photo. I geeked out a little and wanted to offer to take him out for a Big Mac, but I decided against it. The entire week was worth this moment: getting to watch a movie I can enjoy and then meet a filmmaker I respect and then possibly getting the flu from him. No one wanted to be around me for hours. I was completely satisfied with the experience, like the feeling you get when drop that monthlong diet for a trip to Popeye’s.

This is the experience of Sundance. Not only getting to hang out with the film community, but getting to see them enjoy their craft. Waiting for my plane back to Atlanta, I can’t imagine sharing a similar experience in our fair city. I’ll probably see Cloverfield this week because I’m a fan of Godzilla films, but it just won’t be the same unless I get a chance to meet the 300-foot monster following the screening.

Maybe I can get him to actually shake my hand.

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