Sundance 2011

By Adrienne Papp

A lot has changed since Robert Redford decided back in ‘85 that independent films and young filmmakers should have a place to celebrate their work outside of Hollywood. So he created an out-of-the-way film festival through the Sundance Institute.

One of those changes has been that Hollywood now shows up in a big way at the  Festival every year, but luckily little else has affected the way Sundance celebrates. As a result of their holding on to their values and freedom of spirit, this annual event in snow-encrusted Park City, Utah has become huge, with some 50,000 attendees from around the world and a slate of nearly 200 films that would tax the most ardent film fan.  It has also honored an enviable list of successful films created outside the studio system, including Sex, Lies and Videotape, Precious, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, (500) Day of Summer and Winter’s Bone. At Sundance it’s always the unexpected that you hope for, something with daring and a fresh point of view. Uncompromised by the concessions to audience research and market share that so many commercial films live and die by, Sundance is a place where the independent vision can flourish.

Among the most notable films for 2010, Like Crazy, a bi-continental love story, expressed the kind of quirkiness and charm that made (500) Days of Summer such an audience favorite. An off-center version of more traditional romantic-comedies, Like Crazy works on warmth and intelligence and its stars Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones are an appealing duo as they sort through romantic and immigration issues.

Documentaries, always a strong Sundance contender, included an impressive lineup, with How to Die in Oregon and Cindy Meehl’s Buck big audience favorites in the category.  The former examines Oregon’s death-with-dignity law from a variety of perspectives; the other is an intimate portrait of a real-life cowboy and horse whisperer.  These films offer a very different feel in terms of tone but are similar in the way they deal with our basic humanity.  How to Die In Oregon was awarded the Grand Jury Prize with Buck a surprise winner for the Audience honor.  The World Cinema Jury Prize Dramatic Award went to Happy Happy, which is set in Norway and is possibly the most pleasant film about infidelity ever made, and the World Cinema Jury Prize Documentary Award went to critic’s favorite Hell and Back Again, a raw Afghan war documentary in the style of Restrepo.

In less serious categories there was My Idiot Brother with Paul Rudd, and the satire of Salvation Boulevard, two of the more commercial movies shown at Sundance. Rudd plays a kinder, gentler hippie with plenty of unconditional love, and Salvation Boulevard skewers mega-churches as big-business, and features the teaming of veteran actors Pierce Brosnan and Greg Kinnear.

Sean Durkin was honored with the directing award for his somber-toned Martha Marcy Mae Marlene starring Elizabeth Olsen of the Olsen sisters, and a surprised Sam Levinson was awarded the Waldo Salt screenwriting award for Another Happy Day, one of the few prominent titles that wasn’t picked up by a studio for distribution by the end of the festival.

A real crowd-pleaser was the music documentary Troubadour, which captured the Los Angeles music scene in the mid-70s, and specifically the homespun music that came out of my old home, Laurel Canyon Blvd and was sometimes performed at the Troubadour in Los Angeles. Among the musicians who lived in the canyon during this Golden Era were Joni Mitchell, Jim Morrison, Bonnie Raitt, Frank Zappa, members of the Byrds, Crosby Stills and Nash and Love.

“That music was the soundtrack of our lives,” Carol King said during an interview at the festival, where she also performed with James Taylor. “I hear from people who are rhythm and blues aficionados, and it got to them. It got to a woman that I spoke to who lived in Cambodia. It got to the farthest corners of the world, so clearly it had importance for a lot of people. That’s why the period is romanticized, because what that music meant to people just became larger than life.”

Coast to Coast AM host, my very good friend, Rob Simone talked with Demi Moore and Kevin Spacey about their new  financial drama Margin Call, which was a big hit at Sundance and stars Paul Bettany, Demi Moore, Kevin Spacey,  my very favorite Jeremy Irons, Penn Badgley, Stanley Tucci, Simon Baxter and Zachary Quinto, who all showed up at the premier.

The press conference question and answer segment was run-of the mill until Rob Simone asked about the underlying message of the film, which sparked a remarkable exchange.

Simon Baxter commented  “what J.C. (writer J.C. Chandor) did on the page was to leave room for these characters to be human. Often a lot of scripts are ridiculously over-written , every thought or idea every emotional tick or beat is already on the page  and it’s kind of sad because there is nothing to find or discover or play with…”

Paul Bettany jumped in “We felt like a real company, …the speed of which was unreal. We became really quite close..” Kevin Spacey cut in  ” We were shooting at one Penn plaza, we were using the offices of whatever firm had been in that building, a hedge fund that had just gone under, it was really quite appropriate, we were using their offices as trailers, because even if you had trailers you had an 8 minute elevator ride to the lobby…so we were on set the entire time we were up there…”

“Almost like a dorm,” added Demi Moore. Paul Bettany made a funny comment:”That’s just weird, it wasn’t a dorm, nobody was sleeping with each other.” Kevin Spacey got the joke continouing   ”I don’t know where you were…”

The room exploded in laughter.

Margin Call is a thriller that revolves around the key people at an investment bank over a 24-hour period during the early stages of the financial crisis. The tense subject is balanced with a serious drama of a company facing economic disaster.

Following in the tradition of Wall Street 2, Margin Call shines a light on the events leading up the layoffs in the investment banking industry in the month before the economic collapse in 2008. The writing is crisp and fast-paced with riveting performances from Spacey and Irons that have people already talking about possible Oscar consideration.

The Sundance jury awards, on the dramatic side, have sometimes been effective indicators of trending popularities for best picture nomination by the Academy.  Both previous Grand Jury Dramatic Jury winners Precious and Winter’s Bone received the Academy nominations. If the trend continues, Like Crazy may make it three years out of three when Oscar nominations are announced in 2012.

Summary of Sundance Winners:

Grand Jury Prize U.S. Dramatic:
Like Crazy by Drake Doremus

Grand Jury Prize U.S. Documentary:
How To Die in Oregon, directed by Peter D. Richardson

U.S. Dramatic Direction Award:
Sean Durkin for Martha Marcy Mae Marlene

U.S. Documentary Direction Award:
John Foy, Resurrect the Dead: The Mystery of the Toybee Tiles

Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award
Sam Levinson, Another Happy Day

U.S. Documentary Cinematography Award:
The Redemption of General Butt Naked

Special Jury Award for Originality:
Mike Cahill and Brit Marling for Another Earth

Special Jury Award:
Felicity Jones, Like Crazy

Special Jury Dramatic Prize for “creating a documentary for all ages”:
Being Elmo directed by Constance Marks

U.S. Dramatic Audience Award:
Circumstance

U.S. Documentary Audience Award:
Buck, directed by Cindy Meehl

World Cinema Direction:
Paddy Considine for Tyrannasour

World Cinema Jury Prize Dramatic:
Happy Happy

About the Author of This Article:  Lady Adrienne Papp is a recognized journalist who has written for many publications including Savoir, Beverly Hills 90210, Malibu Beach, Santa Monica Sun, The Beverly Hills Times, Brentwood News, Bel-Air View, Celebrity Society, Celeb Staff, It Magazine, Chic Today, LA2DAY, West Side Today among many others. She is the President and CEO of Los Angeles / New York-based publicity company, Atlantic Publicityand publishing house, Atlantic Publisher. Adrienne writes about world trends, Quantum Physics, entertainment and interviews celebrities, world leaders, inventors, philanthropists and entrepreneurs. She also owns Atlantic United Films that produces and finances true stories made for theatrical release or the silver screen. Spotlight News Magazineis owned by Atlantic United, Incwith Adrienne Pappbeing the majority shareholder.

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Oliver Stone Getty Images

By Adrienne Papp

Oliver Stone is a household name. A master of controversial subjects in award winning movies, a legendary provocateur, a brilliant film-maker, director, writer and producer.  Somewhat of a rebel, an influential visionary and a prominent portrayer of uncensored contemporary political and cultural issues, he does not beat around the bush about any issue.  Why would he? He had his own battle fields to win not only as a war veteran who was awarded a Bronze Star for Gallantry and a Purple Heart, but also as a creative genius in Hollywood with a long list of films behind him, winning one Oscar after another.

His first win was for Midnight Express in 1978, but that was just the beginning of his expanding career and fame as a filmmaker.

In 1986 he directed the political film Salvador, starring Oscar-nominated James Woods. But his big hit was the Vietnam war film Platoon, starring Charlie Sheen, Willem Dafoe, Tom Berenger, and Francesco Quinn. Stone then followed up with the critically acclaimed Wall Street . The movie, starring Charlie Sheen and Michael Douglas, focused on the business world of tycoons and stock brokers. The film won an Oscar for Douglas’ portrayal of the villainous Gordon Gekko.

Stone then directed Tom Cruise in an Oscar-nominated role in Born on the Fourth of July for which Oliver Stone won an Academy Award for Directing, which was his third win to date. Later he took a hand in producing several movies, including the Academy Award-winning film Reversal of Fortune, which movie played a crucial role in my own life as well when I contacted Alan Dershowitz, a respected Professor of Law at Harvard University who represented Claus von Bülow (played by Jeremy Irons) on whose actual case the movie was based.

Oliver Stone then returned to the director’s chair in 1991, once again with two giant films in one year: Val KilmerJim Morrison starring as the legendary in Stone’s psychedelic film The Doors. The Doors was overshadowed by Stone’s colossal film JFK, which Stone himself considers the best of his films. In the film, Jim Garrison tackles the conspiracy behind the murder of America’s president John F. Kennedy. The large cast featured such well-known names as Kevin Costner, Tommy Lee Jones, John Candy, Joe Pesci, Donald Sutherland, and Walter Matthau.

Stone’s energy and commitment to his craft is extraordinary without a doubt. Besides the obvious wonder if the man ever sleeps, his list of movies whether as a producer, writer, or director seems endless. Or at least, endlessly successful continuing onto such films as Nixon and Natural Born Killers, both of which he directed. He then moved onto films such as The People vs. Larry Flynt, Any Given Sunday, The Day Reagan Was Shot, and the epic, Alexander, all of which he produced, in addition to South of the Border, a documentary about Hugo Chavez that Stone also directed.

Now he is shooting Wall Street 2. The cast includes Michael Douglas reprising his Gordon Gekko role 23 years later, Shia LaBeouf, Carrie Mulligan, Frank Langella, Josh Brolin and Susan Sarandon.

I first met Oliver Stone in person at a party in his Santa Monica apartment 13 years ago when I was young and naive, and pretty much intimidated by anything and everybody. I choked up in his charismatic, almost regal presence. He seems preoccupied with his thoughts, as most geniuses are, and burns a hole on your forehead with his eyes as he talks. Yet, there is something very humble and reserved about him, almost as if he just wanted to be left alone and away from the celebrity hype and work behind the scenes undisturbed.

Always controversial, Stone recently expressed his concerns about government, media and politics in an interview: “I’d like America to succeed. I get a little nervous about the country making it. The war in Afghanistan is a disaster. We make enemies. Our news media is terrible, they don’t analyze well. TV in America has reached the Babel-state. It’s all crap and bullshit. There’s no news in America, not even on the best channels. It’s superficial, the news is for profit, it’s selling entertainment.”

I take great joy in the fact that we hear this from Oliver Stone. I have been sickened about the news having been analyzed and interpreted by “experts” on TV who get paid handsomely for telling us what to think and how to interpret who said what and why. I find this offensive and outrageous! Not only the news is becoming opinionated and sensational entertainment, but they keep on discussing the stupidest things while the world is going down the drain faster than water can flow down the gutter. Newscast has become a control system more than anything by literally telling us what to think! Where is the integrity in all this?

And when asked about the current presidency Oliver Stone says,

“The question is: Is there a permanent government that makes people do things like go on with this “War on Terror” and “War on Drugs“? The thing is: We have to fix our own country; we’ve said this for years. How do we break gridlock? How do we get healthcare? How do we get anything done? I’m wondering.”

And, I am wondering too along with most Americans and the World!

The richest, most advanced country on Earth and we hardly do or say much anymore that makes any sense at all.

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