A DAY AT THE SUNDANCE SHORTSLAB
A few weeks ago I attended the third Sundance ShortsLab, a day-long event about short filmmaking organized and conducted by the folks from Sundance (primarily, from what I could see, from the festival side of the house.) Sundance has previously put on two other Shortslabs, one in LA and one in Chicago. This was their first event in New York, and those of us in attendance spent the day in an auditorium at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as a variety of speakers and panels unfolded, and several short films were shown.
The day started with Trevor Groth, Sundance’s director of programming, addressing the audience with an overview of the history of Sundance (the festival and the institute) and describing how they had determined to start running these ShortsLabs. Groth said that shorts are always important to Sundance, both as part of their programming blocks and, I gathered, because of the importance they play in the industry as both a proving ground for directors as well as an art form unto themselves.
Groth said that while he loves the “purity of shorts” and the “pure passion” they evince, that of the thousands of shorts submitted to Sundance each year, he and the other programmers were seeing many of the same pitfalls over and over again. Thus they were inspired to create Shortslabs events in which they could provide insight for short filmmakers about honing their crafts.
He also acknowledged that in this single day, with almost 200 people in attendance, that Sundance was reaching more people in one fell swoop than they do over several years of their narrative labs (which tend to take about ten writer/directors per year, though they have several other types of labs as well.) He said he felt that Sundance wanted to democratize the learning and outreach part of their mission and create a more accessible event (again, than the labs, which are extremely competitive to get into.) Entrance to the Shortslab event cost $150, and there was no application process.
The day’s panels were interspersed with short films, both within the panels themselves, as … Read the rest
Category Web Exclusives | Tags: Anna Boden, Benny Safdie, Debra Granik, Jonathan Gray, Josh Safdie, Kickstarter, Matt Dentler, Reed Morano, Ryan Fleck, Sundance, Topspin, Trevor Groth,
