My goal is to go to Sundance or bust!
My wife and I traveled to Park City in January for a kid-free vacation at the Sundance Film Festival.
Prior to our arrival, we were warned that the town would be crowded and traffic horendous. Probably due to our shrinking economy and the excitement of the Obama Inauguration,luckily, this wasn’t so.
There is a strong correlation between Hollywood personalities normally attending Sundance and Hollywood personalities who got invited or felt compelled to attend our recent history-making Presidential Inauguration,apparently.
It was helpful that this was a "quiet" year at Sundance, as it assisted me in learning the ropes, such as how to navigate through the process of obtaining tickets. I think over the course of two weeks at Sundance, I learned 80% of what I need to know in order to achieve the following goals for our next Sundance Festival.:
1) See the films we want to see, including the ones that have “The Buzz”.
2) Obtain the best seats each time.
3) To get extra tickets on short notice,be able.
4) To leave time for a good meal and schedule our movies.
5) Use less money and time taking care of these goals than I did this last year.
A matter of expectations is the Sundance experience really. My wife is particular and likes good seats. Thanks to my Blackberry, it's possible for me to obtain them for us and still stay connected to work while standing in line. My key was to become the member of the "Patron Circle." Gaining priority access to the films without standing in line was the real motivation for making our donation to the Sundance Institute,yes, I love to support the arts. For some people acquiring a ticket for their preferred film is extremely important, even if they have to wait in line.
One of the benefits is that we enjoyed several of the movies. Other selections: "Push", a film about abuse that brought tears to my eyes, and left me with a pain in my gut. "Spread" was my wife's choice for underdog of the year; it's an Ashton Kutcher photoplay situated in Hollywood. "Good Hair", a half-amusing, half-serious docudrama by Chris Rock, about an African American woman's search for straight hairdos, and finally, to round out the list there was "500 Days of Summer" -- a romance with a twist: "Man, She's a Dude!"Of her lack of feminine romatic tendencies because of "Man, she's a dude" was the line that sumed up Zoey Deschanel's chracter, as Summer.
One drawback was having to make daily trips to the Patron Circle Office in order to exchange our tickets. Unluckily, with our passes we could not be allowed view the film before paying for it.
We've walked out on some "stinkers". "Unmade Beds" was an example. We think it was about teen lust run wild in the United Kingdom, but it was so bad we couldn't sit through it to analyze the message. "The Carter" peered into the soul of a man bereft of humanity, who manages to make himself a success in life. The irony there was lost on the public. Finally, "Motherhood" was a true wreck of a film more resembling a bad sitcom for the casting department. We felt it was a total waste of Uma Thurman's amazing gifts, reducing her to the level of a grade B soap star.
We started our Sundance vacation feeling like total strangers to the scene, even though we own a home in Park City since last spring, but somehow the affair grew familiar and somewhat comfortable after a while.
The Surprising:
Having been on location with movie actors and directors on the stage at question and answer sessions after every movie, as well as sitting in theaters with them during movie screenings. Being accorded five star treatment from the staff of the Patron’s Circle Office. Becoming accustomed to the traffic patterns and boarding a taxi for a ride through the back streets and alleys of Park City. Gate crashing at private parties with a friend of a friend whose been invited; all these moments made us feel as though we were experienced hands at the screen.
