1-19-07
Diverse Chicago Field at Sundance and Slamdance
Shélan O’Keefe, John Cusack and Gracie Bednarczyk in Grace is Gone. (Photo: Jon Farmer, courtesy Plum Pictures)
Two feature films and two documentaries with Chicago ties are playing among the elite of American independent cinema at the Sundance and Slamdance film festivals, both underway now in Park City, Utah.
The documentary Chicago 10, about the conspiracy trial of protest organizers at the 1968 Democratic Convention, is the opening night film at Sundance. The John Cusack-starring feature Grace is Gone is in the festival’s U.S. Dramatic Competition.
Brett Morgen’s Chicago 10 mixes archival footage of the protests and the flamboyant trial with animated reenactments featuring the voices of Hank Azaria, Dylan Baker, Nick Nolte, Mark Ruffalo, Roy Scheider, Liev Schreiber and Jeffrey Wright.
Grace is Gone is the debut feature by writer-director James C. Strouse. Producer John Cusack stars as an Iraq War widower struggling to reveal his wife’s death to their two young daughters, played by Chicagoans Shelan O’Keefe and Gracie Bednarczyk. Featuring Alessandro Nivola. Casting by Tenner Paskal Rudnicke.
Grace is Gone shot principal photography in Chicago in April and May, with additional shooting in Florida. Strouse, a native of Goshen, Ind., previously wrote the Goshen-shot, Steve Buscemi-directed InDigEnt feature Lonesome Jim.
Meanwhile, up Park City’s Main Street at Sundance’s edgier stepsister, Slamdance, the noir comedy Crime Fiction has its world premiere, and the hip-hop documentary Rock the Bells screens, both in competition.
As in recent years, Slamdance, now in its 13th year, is actually more competitive than Sundance: 1,450 features and documentaries were submitted for 29 slots, a 2 percent acceptance rate. At Sundance, 125 feature films were selected from 3,287 submissions, a 3.8 percent acceptance rate.
Produced by the recent University of Chicago grads who started Crime Fiction Pictures, Crime Fiction stars screenwriter Jonathan Eliot as a frustrated novelist who gets a sudden shot at success if he’s willing to cover up and exploit a personal tragedy.
The cast includes Christian Stolte, Amy Sloan, Steppenwolf company member Yasen Peyankov, Katrina Lenk, and in multiple roles, Dan Bakkedahl, now a regular on “The Daily Show.”
Casey Suchan and Denis Hennelly’s doc Rock the Bells is a nail-biting concert film building to a climactic reunion performance by ‘90s hip-hop pioneers The Wu-Tang Clan, taped just months before the fatal overdose of Wu-Tang member Old Dirty Bastard.
Rock the Bells is a co-production of Civilian Pictures, whose financing arm, Civilian Capital, is based in Chicago and run by founder and president Peter McDonnell.
The doc is also the first film in the Midwest Independent Film Festival’s 2007 program, screening Feb. 6 at Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema.
Films aren’t the only thing Chicagoans have going in Park City. Outgoing Illinois Film Office executive director Brenda Sexton is hosting an opening-weekend party with Richard Roeper at her Park City condo. The IFO will also sponsor an industry panel and maintain a booth on Main Street.
Local non-profit film incubator Split Pillow returns to Slamdance as a presenting sponsor. They are hosting a fireside chat on Indie Production and Distribution Outside of New York and L.A.