Richard Linklater, writer/director of many a cinephile's favorite film, probably owes a good part of his career to Robert Redford, the founder of the Sundance Film Festival. His first film ("that anyone would care to watch," as he says), Slacker, played at Sundance in 1991. The Sundance Film Festival was, especially in its early years, when small crowds would gather in ramshackle venues like the Park City Library, the antithesis of all things Hollywood, despite Redford's stardom. Linklater had actually submitted a rough cut to Sundance the year before and was rejected. Linklater finished the cut, and eventually it made its way back to the fest. Now it's considered a Sundance classic."The way Sundance works, it became like a big coming-out party," he told Sundance.org. "That was where everybody saw it; to play there was a huge stamp of approval." - YouTube www.youtube.com Linklater, reflecting on Redford's legacy and the festival to The Hollywood Reporter, called Redford's efforts in indie film "revolutionary." When I first got interested in movies in the early '80s, around this time, every year there were a couple indie films that got out by hook or crook, showing at some obscure film festival somewhere. That was just starting. But as Sundance grew, the industry grew around it, and suddenly there was this indie world parallel to the studios that had its own economics and was self-sustaining to some degree. [Sundance] really deserves a lot of credit, and I can’t think of any other person who was...
Published By: NoFilmSchool - Yesterday