25 Movies That Defined The Sundance Film Festival

As you might have noticed from the wall-to-wall level of coverage over the last week or so, the Sundance Film Festival has grown considerably from its humble beginnings back in 1978, when it was inaugurated as the Utah/US Film Festival and had a remit to showcase exclusively American-made independent films, and to promote filmmaking in the region. Robert Redford‘s involvement as a guiding patron led to its name change in 1981, from which point on it expanded gradually, until a kind of Cambrian explosion occurred with the arrival of “sex lies & videotape” 25 years ago. This, a film that, with only a touch of hyperbole, could be said to have remade the festival into the modern titan it is today. In fact, like some of the films it has championed over the years, the main gripe with Sundance these days is that it has become a victim of its own success, selling out its original independent aims to become a media and celebrity-driven extravaganza, which has been co-opted as little more than a testing ground for studios on the prowl for a cheap acquisition. It once was David, the complainers claim, but now it’s become Goliath.

But maybe that is a rather unfair assessment of a festival that continues to do great work in terms of championing new filmmakers and delivering to them a conduit to get their films seen by a larger number of people (if queuing up behind Ashton Kutcher on the odd red carpet is the price to pay for increased exposure, we can’t see too many struggling independent filmmakers complaining). Through the years, the festival has had an enormous impact on the independent filmmaking landscape, launching the careers of some of the very directors, actors, screenwriters and producers without whom we can’t imagine what the film industry, let alone this blog, might look like.

And even as it has showcased these talents, Sundance has been symbiotically affected by many of them too, basking in the halo effect of its association with some of the most respected film professionals working today, even as the image of the ideal “Sundance Film” has changed over the years. So what we have here is not a list of the biggest films the festival has ever produced, nor even the best, but simply an eclectic selection of 25 films that we judge to be quintessentially “Sundance,” in that their fortunes were materially altered by their exposure at the festival, and they, in their turn, further defined our idea of what the Sundance Film Festival is all about.

“Hoop Dreams”
What It’s About: A documentary directed by Steve James following two black Chicagoan teenagers, William Gates and Arthur Agee, from underprivileged backgrounds as they experience financial, social, familial, educational and personal setbacks pursuing their dreams of a pro basketball career.
Year It Played Sundance: 1994, alongside “Clerks” and “Spanking the Monkey” (both on this list), “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Fresh”.
How Was It Received At The Time? Winning the Audience Award at Sundance was just the beginning of the film’s success. It sparked a three-way bidding war, with Fine Line Pictures winning out, due to a fairly unprecedented (for a documentary) deal for the filmmakers which they in turn shared with their young stars and their families (once that money was no longer in danger of revoking their amateur status or scholarships). (More here in The Dissolve’s excellent oral history.)
How Big Did It Get? “Hoop Dreams” took $7.8m at the box office, making it one of the highest-grossing docs ever at that point. Its huge popularity also led to a change in the voting process in the documentary category for the Academy Awards when neither it nor the following Sundance’s breakout doc “Crumb” were nominated, despite huge acclaim. In subsequent years its stature has only increased to the point that it topped the 2007 International Documentary Association’s poll of the 25 all-time greatest docs (interestingly, the Documentary Oscar winner from that year didn’t even place).
Is It Worth The Hype? The film is as immersive now as it ever was, and if it doesn’t feel quite like the lightning bolt it may once have been, that’s probably because its influence on subsequent documentary filmmakers has made itself felt so strongly. It is also a sobering watch today—20 years on and the problems and injustices faced by William and Arthur are still depressingly prevalent. For his part, James is back at Sundance this year with “Life Itself,” his documentary about one of “Hoop Dreams”‘ earliest and most vocal supporters, Roger Ebert.