Sundance / 1

I’ve been back from Park City for almost a week now and I’ve only just begun to stop coughing, drooling and sneezing. It seemed the moment the plane touched down in Denver my temperature rose, the lungs collapsed and I’ve been trying desperately to build up my immune system before heading out to Berlin next Wednesday to once again be faced with cold and snow…albeit nothing like what was experienced at Sundance. So, what of Sundance 2008? Much has already been written about the lack of deals, the ho-hum-ness as opposed to any genuine buzz…but there were some good films there…especially, I think, if you dug deeper than the Premiere and Dramatic Competition sections.

The first day I was in town I saw Marina Zanovich’s Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired and Edet Belzberg’s renamed, The Recruiter. I was dying to see the latter as Belzberg’s 2001 Children Underground was perhaps my favorite documentary that year and I did like her new film, actually more in retrospect than at first. I think that going in I was expecting to see all sorts of underhanded dealings, a funneling through of unprepared, unwitting young men in the name of an Army quota. And I’m sure this happens, it just doesn’t happen here. While I don’t agree with the recruiter’s end goal, I do end up appreciating the fact that he truly believes in what he is doing and Belzberg stays out of it in order that we can come to our own conclusions...or change our preconceived ones.

The Roman Polanski doc was, by far, the best thing I saw at Sundance. Not only laying out the story of Polanski’s court case for unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, which was far more controversial and complicated than I remember, but also delving into his tragic upbringing and the effect of Sharon Tate’s murder, the film was, simply, riveting. And while, like Belzberg’s film above, Marina Zenovich stays out of the picture and let’s the lawyers, the victim herself, tell their sides of the story, I couldn’t help but leave the theatre feeling like Polanski had really been screwed by the media and the judge in this case. And maybe he was, but when you come down to it, really, she was 13 and that’s pretty tough to explain away. Still, I can’t recommend it enough and can’t wait to see it again.

Tomorrow: Alone in Four Walls, Anvil! The Story of Anvil.