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.

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Hamlet 2
(U.S., 2007, 92 min, color, 35mm)
Directed by Andy Fleming. Written by Andy Fleming, Pam Brady. Starring Steve Coogan, Catherine Keener, David Arquette, Amy Poehler and Marshall Bell.

There are no adequate ways to describe the experience of Hamlet 2. Well, there is one way, but you’re not going to like it. OK, ready?

It feels like I just got raped in the face. And for some reason, I’m totally OK with that. And you will be, too. You may even ask for more. There are likely few films at Sundance carried as far by a performance than that of Steve Coogan in Hamlet 2. He’s absurd and hilarious, and he has to be to champion a script this loaded with the offensive material.

I thought racist midgets in In Bruges were bad. Hamlet 2 — in theory — should be worse, but it isn’t. The movie dances across the line of dignity with the grace of a ballerina.

Coogan plays Dana, a failed actor-turned-theater-teacher who never embraces his desolation and lack of talent. His dream of Hollywood greatness stays alive and well in his classroom work, translating such greats as Erin Brockovich to the high school stage. Coogan limps through life guiding his two eager students and attempting parenthood with his wife.

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ABSURDISTAN
(Germany/Azerbaijan, 2007, 88 min, color, 35mm)
Directed by Veit Helmer. Written by Veit Helmer, Zaza Buadze. Starring Maximilian Mauff, Kristyna Malerova, Assun Planas, Kaghat Azelarab, Suzana Petricevic.

If you were to tell me a film using less than 15 minutes of dialog was the best thing I would see at the Sundance Film Festival, I might laugh and then spit on you. There would at least have been a long, crazy laugh.

But you’d be right. Absurdistan is — and I hate saying this — a wonderful display of the strength of international film and storytelling over ours here in the States. I love American film, and in a year in which we’re given two of the best American movies in years (No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood), we’re still behind.

The movie just gets everything right. It’s beautiful, hilarious and heartwarming, but most of all it’s charming. Absurdistan gives us a look at the lengths to which man will go to woo the love of a woman or to simply get in her pants. The story follows a young pair of soon-to-be lovers, Aya and Temelko. Their homeland survives off the hard work of the women, the sexual vitality of the men, and a slow but steady water supply from a pipeline feeding out of the mountains.

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(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. — PARK CITY PUBLIC TRANSPORT BUS — MORNING

Salt Lake City is a pleasant town with what will serve as an adequate taste of what the Sundance Film Festival is about. But the meat and potatoes still rest in Park City. It’s a very small city full of ski resorts and enough money to make Alpharetta jealous.

I have two goals for the day: catching Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden? and stargazing. The latter is simple, really. You just walk the streets stalking famous people. At this point I’d take Jack Black and 50 Cent. Actually, I’d take French Stewart. I have to look like I’m doing my job here.

Parking isn’t really an option on Main Street, so my party finds a Wendy’s and hops on a bus. Transportation inside Park City is free, but the service does encourage donations. As far as I know, I don’t get an expense account, so fat chance of that happening. I can’t help but notice what looks like a newly developed Wal-Mart across the street from the bus stop. Seeing a Wal-Mart here is how I would imagine stumbling across Michael Vick at a PetSmart would feel. There’s not a lot to the town other than rich housing communities and snow.

Skiers board and exit the bus at seemingly every other stop, but they are still a minority. Everyone on the bus appears to be headed to the festival. If the brochures and film booklets stuck in every pocket and purse aren’t enough, it’s obvious where we’re going because of the chatter.

Films are being analyzed, recommended, sliced and diced, and in one woman’s case, weighed on a scale of sexual content vs. lack of sexual content. Someone brings up Ballast and an insult escapes my brain before I can stop it. I’m immediately refuted. Seriously, everyone seems to like this film, and it is beyond me. Batman & Robin people, Batman & freaking Robin.

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WHAT JUST HAPPENED?
(United States, 2008, 107 minutes, color, 35 mm)
Directed by Barry Levinson, written by Art Linson
Starring Robert DeNiro, Bruce Willis, Sean Penn, Catherine Keener, Stanley Tucci and John Turturro

I have this theory about Robert De Niro, and it goes something like this: Use only in case of emergency. That’s not to say Bobby can’t do any film he wants. He deserves that option. But when it comes to films like What Just Happened?, it’s like Michael Jordan joining the Harlem Globetrotters.

It’s fun to see him there, but you just can’t get over feeling that he needs to be playing at a higher level.

That may be my biggest criticism of What Just Happened?. In a film stacked with a marvelous cast that lives up — or in Bruce Willis’ case, surpasses — expectations, De Niro assumes the role of captain for a ship that runs just fine on its own.

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(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. — TROLLEY BOX OFFICE — MORNING

There are great perks to being locals during the Sundance Film Festival. For one, Utes can purchase tickets in advance for any screening they want before the horde descends upon their quiet, mountain town. Box offices are set up in Park City — the actual site of the festivities — and Salt Lake City, which hosts screenings in two theaters: the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center and the Tower Theatre. So the collective buzz of the events seeps down the mountain into the state capital.

We’ve decided to spend the day in Salt Lake screening two films, the festival opener In Bruges with Colin Farrell and a small, independent production by a first-time director called Ballast. I know nothing about either film. In Bruges will be showing at Rose Wagner, a gigantic, ultramodern theater packed with balconies and the type of stage you’d expect for one of the world’s best film festivals.

Then there’s Tower, which will remind you (anyone over the age of 25) of the days when floors were sticky, seats uncomfortable and movies were still about what was on the screen and not the 27 ads beforehand. Tower’s lobby even doubles as an old-school movie rental with several hundred films you’ve never heard of but probably should.

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BALLAST
(USA, 2007, 96 min, color, 35mm)
Directed/written by Lance Hammer
Starring Michael J. Smith Sr., Jim Myron Ross, Tarra Riggs, Johnny McPhail

You are going to hear quite a bit about this film, and I will be honest, I cannot figure out why. It has affected me to such a degree that I will not be using contractions throughout this entire review. I want every word to be spelled out against the growing storm of enthusiasm for this film by first-time director Lance Hammer.

The story is simple, and that may be its greatest problem. Ballast is a movie about a tragedy and its affect on a small Mississippi family. There are three main characters who deserve our attention. We meet James first, a 12-year-old boy with too much time on his hands. Then there’s Lance Lawrence, an older man who shares ownership of a local store with his twin brother Darius. Tragedy slips in when Lance Lawrence finds his brother dead, having committed suicide for some reason we are never adequately given.

Perhaps living in rural Mississippi is enough. Ballast does do a good enough job of emphasizing the monotony of such an existence. No one expresses this better than our third character, Marlee, a struggling single mother who pays for her trailer and son James’ motorbike gas by scrubbing toilets all day.

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IN BRUGES
(United Kingdom, 2007, 101 min, color, 35mm)
Directed/written by Martin McDonagh
Starring Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Ralph Fiennes

Truly talented writers can form a jumble of words into a sonnet or a make a trip to the dentist seem exciting. Martin McDonagh could probably do both, but what he’s really good at is making racism fun — especially when it involves midgets.

If you’re offended by the last sentence, you probably should be. But in McDonagh’s latest work — In Bruges — nothing seems offensive. Even a racist midget. The film was selected to open the 2008 Sundance Film Festival, and the committee seems to know what it was doing.

McDonagh earned an Oscar for his 2006 short film, Six Shooter. He doesn’t venture far from his genre here with a skillfully mixed blend of violence and humor. But Pulp Fiction this is not. In Bruges is more of a caper film without the caper. There is violence, but not enough to turn the stomach. Instead, we’re blessed with the downtime following the crime, and through McDonagh’s eyes, it’s actually very exciting.

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(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.)

Sun-dancing

By Glenn LaFollette

INT. — HARTSFIELD-JACKSON AIRPORT — DAY

A crowded terminal BUSTLES with the TAPPING of feet and the CLICKING of BlackBerry keys and the RIPPING of ticket stubs.

A thick, blanketing snow falls just beyond the terminal windows, clinging to anything it can find.

A lone WRITER sits at the end of a long row of seats, staring at his pants and the four-inch-long pool of ketchup spreading down his knee, GROANING because of his two-hour snow delay and lack of hot dog coordination.

This is how I left Atlanta — a booming, all-American city with too much traffic, great diversity and more homeless people than you can shake a stick at it. It’s home and it’s beautiful. Why would you ever want to leave? OK, besides running out of water and a retarded governor, why else would you ever want to leave?

Well, this particular week I had a very good reason. It’s called the Sundance Film Festival, and it’s everything a film junkie, budding writer or celebrity seeker could want. I find myself to be a little of all three.

If you’re not familiar — and I’m sure you are if you’ve made it past the first 157 words — Sundance is an annual film festival in Park City, Utah, bringing together an eclectic mix of ambitious independent filmmakers. The festival has been going since 1978 and has given national spotlight to such films as Reservoir Dogs, The Blair Witch Project, Napoleon Dynamite, Little Miss Sunshine, and Sex, Lies, and Videotape. It’s basically a springboard for the hoping-to-be-rich-and-famous to land a major distribution deal or at least some street cred.

Sundance was actually named after Robert Redford’s portrayal of the Sundance Kid, because it was his favorite character. I found that cool and fortunate, since his favorite role could have been that of Johnny Hooker in The Sting. Hooker Film Festival just doesn’t carry the same nobility.

What you’ll find here are my collective thoughts, reviews, observations and drunken ramblings as I journey into the heart of Mormon country for the dream that is Sundance. Currently, it is nothing more than an idea. For all I know, it could just be a Mormon trick to fool the rich and famous into dumping one crazy religion — Tomcruiseology — for another.

Alien spirits or Jesus in Missouri? You pick your poison.

For now, I’m going to get back to cleaning my pants and waiting for the good people of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to de-ice my plane. From the looks of it, I don’t think they’ve ever had to do it before. It must snow in Atlanta as much as it rains. Just something else for the governor to pray about.

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