The Underground Filmmaker
Jack Truman with Meritxell Ortega & Mercedes Espelleta
Stars of the new film MUSGO
At the film's World Premiere at Slamdance 2013
Monday Night Blog – Park City –
Sundance/Slamdance 2013 – 1/21/2013
Day 4 in Park City
All right. Here we are. The fourth and
my final day in Park City this time around. The last day at Sundance and Slamdance is over for
me. And I'll have to be honest. I'm glad it is.
I have to tell you something. Overall,
in a nutshell, this year at Sundance was very disappointing. It was a
real dud. I never remember it being this bad of an experience. And
I've been coming here a lot of times over the years. Just as recent
as last year, when I was on the Short Film Jury at Slamdance. The
whole Sundance Park City madness experience was the same as always
even as recently as last year. But not this year. I was amazed at how
much of a dud it was. Bad films, bad parties, very little networking,
most deals already made well ahead of time.....I'll have to tell you
something. I'm glad that I've been here several times before. Because
if this would have been my first time to Sundance, this dud of an
experience would have made me think it was always like this.
This year, it was SO L.A.; if you're
from L.A., or have ever been to L.A., you know what I mean. It wasn't
independent like it's always been. This festival this time around was
SO Hollywood, fake, artificial, and industry driven. Not the true
independent spirit like years before. To be honest, it's sad to see. I'm not going to sugar coat nothing. I'm just going to tell how things are straight up. People deserve to know that.
It's nothing like it used to be.
I could go on for pages about the
change and how it's not for the better. But for now, I'll just leave
it at that.
Let's get on to what I did here on my
final day in a nutshell:
I got up here at the Motel 6 room in
Salt Lake City around 8:30 this morning. Opal called into Enterprise
first thing to extend the rental car for 2 more days. Then I drank
coffee while waking up, writing this morning's blog, and lining up
today's Sundance/Slamdance schedule here in the motel room. We left
Motel 6 around 10:30 – 11:00 this morning heading to Park City.
Once parking the car down by the
Sundance Headquarters, took the free shuttle to Main Street, and
walked up to the Sundance Channel headquarters for some coffee. We
were in a rush, because by the time we parked the car, got to Main
Street, and up to where the coffee was, it was already around 12:30;
and we had a lot to do in the next 20 minutes. So we took the coffee
with us, crossed the street to Slamdance at TMI, got tickets for some
films later today, a few Luna health bars, and headed down Main
Street to the Claim Jumper. There was a panel there at 1:00 that had
2 great friends of mine I had to see who I hadn't seen in some time:
Scilla Andreen and Lynn Shelton.
Scilla's online distribution company
Indieflix is the online distributor for our hit cult short film PHONE
SEX GRANDMA. And I got to know Lynn when her first film I GO WAY BACK
won Slamdance in 2006, when our first film PHONE SEX GRANDMA was
there. So I was really looking forward to reconnecting with them. It
was a great time this afternoon. The best time I had all day.
Chatting with Lynn. Talking with Scilla. Seeing Opal reconnect with
both of them. Lynn has a new film here at Sundance this week called
TOUCHY FEELY. I am so happy for all of her success over these last
few years. And she looked great, too. Really good.
After visiting with Lynn and Scilla,
and going to their panel with Rick Rosenthal, we headed over to the
Sundance House around 2:30 and I checked emails. Nothing important
there. Then it was back up the Main Street walk towards Slamdance.
But on the way, a stop at the Morningstar Farms building for those
great Vegan Veggie burgers. Yummy.
After gobbling down the vegan burgers,
Opal and I headed next door to TMI for Slamdance. We decided to spend
most of the rest of the day around here. After all, we are Shorts
Programmers for the festival this year, and need to see some more
Slamdance films. And we both have the best time when we're around there. When we got in the lobby, we saw a couple of Opal's
new PHONE SEX GRANDMA fans, director Brian Bolster of the new
Slamdance short film THE MERCANTILE, which I've been hearing great
things about. We talked with Brian and his partner in the lobby for
about 45 minutes. That was a fun time. Relaxing. After chatting, just
for a few minutes, we walked across the street to Cisero's. I was
invited to the Louisiana Film Festival party. There was a line
waiting outside, but it went quick. And then the new normal happened.
They didn't have me on the list. Man, I was pissed off. I'd RSVP'd
over a week ago, got a confirmation email, then this afternoon, got a
reminder email of my confirmation. And here they didn't have me on
the fucking list. What is this shit? I was getting fed up with all of
this. The guy told us to go on in. And that party was a mob of
artificial Sundance Hollywood fakes. We weren't there for 5 minutes
and walked out, walked back across the street to Slamdance at the
Treasure Mountain Inn, and went to the Slamdance Happy Hour mixer. It
felt like I was walking back in my relative's house back home in the boonies. Networked and
chatted with some people for about 30 minutes, then we headed to the
Slamdance Collective screening of I WANT TO BE AN AMERICAN.
The Slamdance Collective I WANT TO BE
AN AMERICAN was different. I like alternative, experimental,
underground stuff. And that's what this was. 7 short films that my
good friend Peter Baxter put together with a couple of other guys
based on an idea. And Peter had a short in the collection called ALL
ABOUT EVE that featured his daughter Eve. Damn. I could see Peter in
her face. I just felt I was with family and friends that entire time. It made for a
neat, cool, fun experience. I was really happy for Peter.
After the Slamdance Collective, we had
a little time to kill. Several of our planned mixers and parties had
petered out, with either getting emails that they were at capacity,
events cancelled, or just not having time to go to them. So we missed
Slava's Indiegogo mixer, the Kickstarter party, the Nintendo Lounge
event, Sundance Headquarters party, and a couple other events. Either
they were cancelled, too much of a mob to get in, or we just didn't
have the time to go. So Opal and I walked upstairs to catch the tail
end of the annual Hot Tub Summit at Slamdance. And damn. I'm SO glad we
didn't go earlier. It was just a bunch of young people around in and
out of the tub. It looked like a fucking college party. Not anything
like the cool one they had last year with just a handful of people in
the tub. And it was cold out there too. We headed back in the TMI
area by the Slamdance office for a few minutes, got some tickets for
the German mockumentary film KOHLHAAS, then walked over next door the
the Morningstar Farms building for another Vegan Veggie burger
dinner.
After dinner, we got in a few minutes
late to KOHLHAAS. I'll tell you something. I'd been hearing great
things about this film. But was really disappointed. I did not think
it was a very good movie at all. The filming was done well, but a very boring, weird movie in my opinion. I must be in the minority, because
everyone else in the room was enjoying it. The best part to me was
when the final credits were running. But you know, what's my opinion?
It's just one opinion. Like they say, opinions are like assholes.
Everyone's got one.
After KOHLHAAS, we had about 15 minutes
until a film I had heard great things about: MUSGO. I was really
looking forward to seeing that film. Chatted in the hallway with a
couple of the stars in the film I had made friends with a couple days
ago, along with some other film friends. Then it was time for the
late screening of MUSGO; our last film to see here at the festival.
MUSGO was a different film. The first 5
minutes were great. Awesome. Disturbing. I loved it. I thought, what
the fuck? Wow. Where is this film going to go? I can't wait. Then,
all of a sudden, it became a dud. The entire film until the last 10
minutes, in my opinion, was a dud. Not bad, but nothing to write home
about. The thing about this film was that the beginning was so great, you kept glued throughout the entire film waiting to see what was going to happen next. Now, that is good filmmaking. I will say this. Out of all the movies I saw here in town this
week, MUSGO, in my opinion, was the best of the bunch.
After the screening, I chatted with the
stars of the film. I really like those girls. They are hot. I want to
work with them. If I would have stuck around, we would have got lucky
and had a lot of fun together tonight. It would have made for a fun,
wild night to end my final night here. But I had to get back to the
room. It was already well after midnight. So I said some final
goodbyes to the hot girls, some Slamdance friends, then we headed
back to the car, drove back to Salt Lake City, and got back at the
Motel 6 room about 1:30 in the morning. By 2:00 in the morning I was knocked out.
4 days in Park City. Sundance and
Slamdance 2013. And I'll tell you what. Honestly...I'm glad my 4 days
are over.
I'm so looking forward to driving back
today to the West Coast. More than you know.
THE ACCEPTABLE SIN
Award-Winning Documentary Short Film
Featuring Opal Dockery
Directed by Jack Truman
Screened at over 30 Film Festivals Worldwide
A Dixie Film
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