Category: News

“Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more.” —Oscar Wilde
The Skoll World Forum takes place in Oxford every year, a vibrant convening of civil society organizations run by committed and often renowned social entrepreneurs, all working to build sustainable human-centered business models and find solutions to “the world’s most pressing challenges.”  
This year, the conference was built around the theme of ambition.

At Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, I talked with some of the documentary students.  A student named Aimee, with a particular interest in narrative, asked about the origins of the “isolation” of protagonist Ahlo in The Rocket. The conversation broadened to displacement from home, from one’s own history and the isolation that comes form losing one’s sense of self.

I have clambered over live bombs in foreign lands but when it comes to showing my work, I am always mildly terrified, especially in places far from my home and the origin of the film.  But screening The Rocket at the Harrisburg Area Community College was full of all the emotion, curiosity and connection that makes filmmaking worthwhile.   Firstly, Will Guntrum (Department Chair – Communications, Humanities and the Arts) shook my hand with all that crushing masculinity that I thought, “Oh…he didn’t like something in the film and is about to tell me.

The O2, 15 April 2014 — Sundance Institute and The O2 today announced the winners of the Short Film Competition for the third Sundance London film and music festival, 25-27 April at The O2: Russian Roulette by Ben Aston has won the Official Selection Award and Shadows of Time by Sambit Banerjee has won the Community Choice Award. Both films will screen at the festival and both filmmakers will receive prizes including a three-night stay at The Langham Hotel in London. Also announced today was a new prize: that a selection of the finalists’ films will screen on London Live.

The Cold Lands Makes Its Digital Premiere June 3 Following a Theatrical Run
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced the 12 independent films that will make their digital debut this spring through a variety of platforms and storefronts, via the Institute’s Artist Services program, which provides artists supported by the Institute with exclusive opportunities for creative self-distribution, marketing and financing for their work. Titles began premiering today, and will roll out through June 3. For details visit sundance.

Hits premiered last January at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and screens again at Sundance London beginning Saturday, April 26. Click here to learn more and purchase tickets. Director David Cross will also be on hand for a conversation with fellow comedic writer and filmmaker David Wain on April 26 at the Brooklyn Bowl.

The O2, 8 April 2014 — Sundance Institute and The O2 announced today the programme of FREE talks, screenings, events and music performances for the third Sundance London film and music festival, happening at The O2 from 25-27 April. Many of these events will take place in the Festival Hub at Brooklyn Bowl, The O2’s newest entertainment venue, which will be open to the public over the festival weekend.
On-stage talks (the “Brooklyn Bowl Sessions”) were programmed by Sundance Institute, which annually presents the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, U.

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced that it will tour a package of eight short films from the 2014 Sundance Film Festival to a variety of destinations including art house theaters, museums, college theaters and general event spaces, across the country throughout.
Showcasing a wide variety of story and style, the 94-minute Sundance Film Festival Short Film Tour features both fiction and documentary short films and includes three films that won awards at the 2014 Festival. Venues that wish to book the short film program and audiences interested in seeing if it will visit a location near them should go to sundance.

Last month, Sundance Institute hosted a pair of ShortsLabs in Philadelphia and Miami that offered day-long workshops for shorts filmmakers. Focusing on narrative short-form storytelling, each event featured panels, discussions, and screenings with a wide-ranging mix of filmmakers and industry professionals. Below you can listen to a podcast of highlights from each event that includes tips, advice, and anecdotes from a variety of filmmakers.

Park City, UT — Sundance Institute and the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities announced today that Film Forward: Advancing Cultural Dialogue will host free screenings of eight films with moderated discussions, panels and artist roundtables in Taipei, Taichung and Taitung, Taiwan. For a full schedule of events, venues and partners in Taiwan visit sundance.org/filmforward.

Los Angeles, CA —Sundance Institute renewed agreements with six non-profit organizations as collaborators with the Institute’s Artist Services program – which provides filmmakers with exclusive opportunities for digital distribution, marketing and financing solutions for their work. The Austin Film Society has been added as a new collaborator, and together with Britdoc, The Bertha Foundation, San Francisco Film Society, IFP, Film Independent and Cinereach will consult with the Institute to continue to shape the Artist Services program and its offerings to filmmakers.
“We’re very proud of the Artist Services program we’ve built in the last three years, and to be collaborating with these top film organizations to provide access to distribution for great independent films,  evolve strategies to meet the demands of a shifting distribution landscape and ensure the long-term sustainability of the field,” stated Keri Putnam, Executive Director of Sundance Institute.

What happens when the trajectories of two apparently disparate fields cross paths? What emerges from that intersection point where some of the most creative minds of our time collide like atoms brought together by two thought leaders who, like scientists in a lab, have a hunch that something powerful will happen when you combine proactive elements?

That’s what happened when Robert Redford met with Jeff Skoll. Together they imagined a collaboration that would become Stories of Change: Social Entrepreneurship in Focus Through Documentary Film. The idea was to combine the power of storytelling and the growing social entrepreneurship movement to reframe, examine, and amplify an innovative approach to solving the central issues of our time.