Sundance Institute Archives & collection

Short Film Spotlight: Broken Orchestra (dir. Charlie Tyrell)

The Symphony for a Broken Orchestra project collected hundreds of broken instruments from the Philadelphia public school system, fixed them, and then returned them to the hands of students.

Film stills and poster courtesy of Broken Orchestra.

“Did you know your foot’s as big as your arm from your elbow to your wrist?” That’s a little bit of trivia offered by Julia Roberts’ Vivian in the 1990 film Pretty Woman. Another bit of trivia for you: Pretty Woman actually had its beginnings as a Sundance lab project! In 1988, screenwriter J.F. Lawton (above) attended the Screenwriters and Directors Labs to workshop his script, then titled Three Thousand. 

Since the film recently celebrated the 30th anniversary of its release, we thought we would share some photos taken on set of the project during the Directors Lab that year.

Resource actors Pamela Gidley and Peter Gallagher work on a scene directed by lab fellow Jim Simpson. © 1988 | John Schaefer 

Some of the biggest moments and movements in modern human history have been (or are being) carefully documented by independent artists working in film, theatre, VR, music, and beyond. For Preservation Week, we’ve highlighted a selection of Sundance-supported stories told by extraordinary artists during extraordinary times that must be seen and remembered. Read the full blog post Preserving the Record: Why Storytelling Is So Vital in Times Like These.

Director and screenwriter Gina Prince-Bythewood workshopped her award winning film Love & Basketball at the 1998 Directors Lab and premiered it two years later at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival.  This month marks 20 years since Love & Basketball’s release and ESPN recently posted an interview with Prince-Bythewood, along with the cast and crew of the groundbreaking film and it’s definitely worth checking out, 'Love & Basketball': An oral history of the film that changed the game.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the release of Exit Through the Gift Shop in theaters. This acclaimed documentary premiered at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival as a surprise screening. Fittingly, as the film itself has its share of secrets and mysteries, such as whether or not the whole premise of the film is entirely fake. The mystery at the crux of it all is a question that remains as captivating and flummoxing as ever: who IS Banksy?

The above photos are stencil pieces purportedly created by Banksy in Park City, UT, while in attendance for the film’s premiere. Credit: © 2010 Sundance Institute | Photos by Eric Tsou

Below is a still of Banksy from Exit Through the Gift Shop, courtesy of Paraoid Pictures.

Longtime alum Roger Ross Williams’ new documentary tells the rich history of the Apollo Theater in Harlem – The Apollo is available to stream for free in April on HBO. 

“It’s 85 years of the history of black music and black entertainment in this country. We used music and art to lift ourselves out of oppression.”  - Roger Ross Williams

Williams received a 2011 Sundance Documentary Fund Grant for his first feature length documentary God Loves Uganda, attended the Documentary Edit and Story Lab with the film in 2012, and premiered it during the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. Life, Animated, Roger Ross Williams’ second feature documentary, premiered at the 2016 Festival and won the Directing Award: U.S. Documentary.

Most recently Roger Ross Williams attended the 2019 Sundance Film Festival with Traveling While Black, an installation and VR experience at New Frontier.

Stream The Apollo on HBO and check out the trailer below:

In honor of World Theatre Day, we’re highlighting theatre artists and the work they do. 

(pictured above) Director Chay Yew during a rehearsal of There's Always the Hudson at the 2017 Theatre Lab.

Andre De Shields participates in a reading of Lemon Andersen’s ToasT at the 2012 Theatre Lab. De Shields was most recently in the 2019 Best Musical Tony Award winner, Hadestown.

Playwright and composer Jeanine Tesori works with Judy Kuhn, Raul Esparza, and Beth Malone on Fun Home at the 2012 Theatre Lab. Fun Home went on to win 5 Tony Awards in 2015, including Best Musical.

© 2017 Sundance Institute | Photo by Herve Hote

Self-isolating got you down? Take this as an opportunity to finally see all those films you keep moving to your “Watch Later” list. Here are a few feel-good Sundance faves that we love to get you started.

Short Film Spotlight: Green

Green, an undocumented Turkish pedicab driver, unwittingly draws police attention, endangering his brother, his community, and himself.

Director/screenwriter Suzanne Andrews Correa, screenwriter/producer Mustafa Kaymak, and producer Michael Peters took home the Short Film Jury Award: U.S. Fiction during the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. 

Film still and poster courtesy of Green. Photo: Mustafa Kaymak, Aziz Capkurt, Erol Afsin, Suzanne Andrews Correa, and Michael Peters attend the premiere of Shorts Program 4. © 2019 Sundance Institute | Photo by Lauren Wester

Don’t say his name, but do check out the official trailer for Sundance alums director/screenwriter Nia DaCosta, screenwriter/producer Jordan Peele, and screenwriter Win Rosenfeld’s new take on the terrifying urban legend that is Candyman.

Nia DaCosta workshopped her first feature, Little Woods, during the 2015 Directors Lab, Jordan Peele premiered Get Out during a surprise screening at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, and Win Rosenfeld premiered Lorena alongside Jordan Peele at the 2019 Festival.

© Sundance Institute | L–R, from top left: Ekwa Msangi by Caydie McCumber; Janicza Bravo by Jemal Countess; Ava DuVernay by Mark Leibovitz; Euzhan Palcy by Ron Hill; Gina Prince-Bythewood with Sanaa Lathan, photographer unknown; Dee Rees by Dan Campbell; and Ayoka Chenzira, photographer unknown

Black women directors have created some of the most powerful, nuanced, and layered stories of our time. From indie hits to serious blockbusters, projects written and directed by black women have proven to be essential in contributing a unique cinematic gaze. In the span of 39 years, Sundance Institute has supported numerous black women artists in telling their stories via labs, grants, and the annual Festival in Park City. 

In celebration of Black History Month, we’re highlighting black women feature-film directors with ties to Sundance Institute. We’ve chosen 11 artists who have worked to portray the intricate lives of black women, bring into focus cultural aspects of the African diaspora, and express socially relevant themes through film.

Short Film Spotlight: Jáaji Approx.

Against landscapes that the artist and his father traversed, audio of the father in the Ho-Chunk language is transcribed using the International Phonetic Alphabet, which tapers off, narrowing the distance between recorder and recordings, new and traditional, memory and song.

Director Sky Hopinka will make an exciting return to Sundance for the 2020 Festival with malni - towards the ocean, towards the shore; a New Frontier film exploring the origin of the death myth of the Chinookan people.

-

Let's take a lesson from Mr. Rogers for World Kindness Day and remember that: “The greatest thing we can do is to help somebody know that they're loved and capable of loving.”

Watch Morgan Neville's 2018 Sundance Film Festival documentary Won't You Be My Neighbor? and get inspired to do something nice for someone today on World Kindness Day.

With his gentle voice and heartfelt words of wisdom, Fred Rogers served as a compassionate surrogate father for generations of American children who tuned in to public television. He believed in love as the essential ingredient in life and was able to assist kids through difficult situations armed merely with handmade puppets suggesting tolerance and acceptance. An ordained Presbyterian minister, Mr. Rogers made speaking directly and openly to children his life’s work, both on and off his long-running show. He was at the forefront of a movement devoted to meeting the specific needs of children and was considered a radical back then for saying, “I like you just the way you are.”

Animated sequences are peppered between archival footage of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and interviews with Fred Rogers’s family, friends, and colleagues. Examining Rogers’s legacy, Academy Award–winning director Morgan Neville (20 Feet from Stardom) offers a deliberate and beautiful tribute to an authentic human being and provides a much-needed salve for these often-fraught times.

Find Won't You Be My Neighbor? on-demand.

The newly released Honey Boy is a collaboration between director Alma Har'el and screenwriter/star Shia LaBeouf that explores the psychological fallout of growing up in a home marked by addiction. A semi-autobiographical film for LaBeouf, the script was born out of an assignment during court-ordered rehab where he was tasked with writing out his life memories. He sent the writings to Har’el, who immediately knew that this was a story they had to tell together. Known for her visionary style in music videos and experimental documentaries, this was Har’el’s first narrative feature, and she was awarded a Dramatic Special Jury Award for Vision and Craft at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival.

When 12-year-old Otis starts to find success as a child television star in Hollywood, his ex-rodeo-clown father returns to serve as his guardian. When Otis isn’t on set charming audiences, he spends his days with his father at an extended-stay motel on the edge of the city, enduring his overbearing father’s abuse. Honey Boy follows two threads of time, watching father and son's contentious relationship and their attempts to mend it across the course of a decade.