With more and more celebrities streaming into Park City, Utah for the 25th Sundance Film Festival, the screenings and deals are beginning to rack up.
Hollywood's appetite for independent films is shrinking as studios reduce spending and shift their focus to making sequels and larger-budget films that are better bets for profitability. More than 100 films hope to attract distributors, who must gamble on unpredictable audience trends. The result is lower expectations for filmmakers who traditionally have found a market at Sundance.
The market for independent films has already been thrown off balance. Last year's big Sundance acquisitions (Hamlet 2, American Teen) failed to make money in theaters, the economy is in the dumper despite a modestly up year for studio movies, and a large number of boutique distributors - the companies that traditionally exist to buy Sundance fare - went out of business in 2008.
Consequently, it's absurdly easy to get dinner reservations in Park City and find a seat on the festival shuttle buses. Plus the festival is still good for fantastic star gazing.
Featured in the gallery: Ben Affleck, Ewan McGregor, Michelle Tractenberg, Mike Tyson, Amy Poehler, DJ AM, Paris Hilton, Dominic Monaghan, Nick Cannon, Tom Arnold, Brittany Flickinger, Virginia Madsen, Ashley Judd, Emma Roberts, John Schneider, Sam Rockwell, Andie MacDowell, Emily Blunt, Goran Visnjic, Mark Harmon, Guillermo del Toro, Antoine Fuqua, Wesley Snipes, Jill Hennessy, Devon Aoki, Alan Cumming, Anne Heche, and James Tupper.
Check out all 70+ photos from the Sundance Film Festival in the gallery!
Hollywood's appetite for independent films is shrinking as studios reduce spending and shift their focus to making sequels and larger-budget films that are better bets for profitability. More than 100 films hope to attract distributors, who must gamble on unpredictable audience trends. The result is lower expectations for filmmakers who traditionally have found a market at Sundance.
The market for independent films has already been thrown off balance. Last year's big Sundance acquisitions (Hamlet 2, American Teen) failed to make money in theaters, the economy is in the dumper despite a modestly up year for studio movies, and a large number of boutique distributors - the companies that traditionally exist to buy Sundance fare - went out of business in 2008.
Consequently, it's absurdly easy to get dinner reservations in Park City and find a seat on the festival shuttle buses. Plus the festival is still good for fantastic star gazing.
Featured in the gallery: Ben Affleck, Ewan McGregor, Michelle Tractenberg, Mike Tyson, Amy Poehler, DJ AM, Paris Hilton, Dominic Monaghan, Nick Cannon, Tom Arnold, Brittany Flickinger, Virginia Madsen, Ashley Judd, Emma Roberts, John Schneider, Sam Rockwell, Andie MacDowell, Emily Blunt, Goran Visnjic, Mark Harmon, Guillermo del Toro, Antoine Fuqua, Wesley Snipes, Jill Hennessy, Devon Aoki, Alan Cumming, Anne Heche, and James Tupper.
Check out all 70+ photos from the Sundance Film Festival in the gallery!
LK says:
What is Ben Affleck doing there? His wife JUST had a baby. A-hole.