By Drew Grant 1/22 1:25pm

Sundance Film Festival

7 Photos

You go, boy.

The Observer’s Grand Jury Prizes for Sundance

Sundance Film Festival, perhaps the most sporty/mainstream of all the cinema fests (Cannes more about getting drunk in the sun and being weird, SXSW is more about being the next Lena Dunham), is currently full swing. Which means that all the celebrities have mercifully vacated the premises for a week and are up in Utah, pretending to know what those white, flaky stuff on the ground happens to be. Though we haven’t seen the film selection this year because we’re still not allowed in NC-17-rated films, we do have our own Grand Jury selection awards to hand out for Excellence in Sundancing. Take a look. Read More

By Foster Kamer 1/27/12 5:04pm

FUNNY PEOPLE

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Video: James Murphy, Trapped Between Two Terrible, Hilarious, Aging Hipsters in a Taxi

DFA Records’ co-founder and retired LCD Soundsystem bandleader James Murphy has always exhibited a certain stripe of self-awareness that other musicians could probably take lessons from. In one of two films to feature Mr. Murphy at this year’s Sundance Film Festival—the other one being the documentary about his band’s final concert—he has a cameo role as a guy stuck between two obnoxious, aging hipsters in a taxi. Read More

By Ted Gushue 1/21/12 3:31pm

Sundance Film Festival

Wiz Khalifa at Bing Bar.

Plucky Search Engines, Elijah Wood and the Art of the Sundance Open Bar

Walking down the main drag in Park City, The Observer remembered one thing: This place is tiny. We’re talking NoLita tiny. Nestled between Park City and Deer Valley Ski Resorts, the diminutive town transforms itself once a year, at the crack of Robert Redford’s whip, into the epicenter of the Sundance Film Festival. It’s 10:30 p.m. on the first night (sort of), and this frigid hamlet is slammed. Read More

By David D'Arcy 3/24/10 2:33am

Laughing All the Way to the Banksy

With mutton-chop sideburns, a gone-fishing hat and a Ratatouille-style accent, Thierry Guetta is a character that documentary filmmakers pray for: gregarious, oddball, dogged and hungry for fame. In April, a documentary about Mr. Guetta—who’s either an overnight art-world sensation, or wholesale bogus creation—opens in New York, directed by British art-star Banksy. But fans of Mr. Read More

By Barry Harbaugh 1/27/10 8:49pm

Sundance Dispatch: A Novel Juror

PARK CITY, UTAH—On the morning of Tuesday, Jan. 26, during the first and welcome lull of the Sundance Film Festival, novelist Russell Banks met The Observer after finishing an early run in the snow.

Mr. Banks is one of five jurors—among them, Park Posey (The Actress); Jason Kilot (The Producer); Karyn Kusama (The Writer/Director); Read More

By Barry Harbaugh, Staff 1/26/10 8:23pm

The Brothers Safdie: New York’s Sundance Kids

PARK CITY, UTAH—At 449 Main Street, about a half-mile from the Egyptian Theater, Entertainment Weekly has set up something of a publicity oasis—all patent leather couches atop faux arctic pelts, with young attractive types in matching flannel and black berets bringing you your double-espresso and bison chili free of charge. On the floor above, they’ve been photographing actors Read More

By Christopher Rosen 12/03/09 4:36pm

The Three Sundance Films You Can’t Miss

While the success of films like Little Miss Sunshine, Once and Precious prove that the Sundance Film Festival still holds some pretty serious weight in Hollywood, something about the grandaddy of them all has—shall we say—dulled. Perhaps Sundance lost some edge around the same time it featured heavily in a plotline on Entourage. Sensing this, Read More