Sundance, the extremely influential U.S. movie competition co-founded by Robert Redford, is shifting to a brand new residence in Colorado, organizers mentioned Thursday.
For the previous 4 many years, Sundance has been held every winter in Utah’s Park City, launching the 12 months’s hottest impartial motion pictures within the swanky Rocky Mountain ski city amid freezing temperatures at an altitude of two,150 meters.
But because the competition has grown in scale and significance, many attendees have complained it has change into prohibitively costly to attend. Many locals additionally dread the annual inflow of Hollywood bigwigs and the accompanying gridlock attributable to fleets of luxurious SUVs.
Talks a few new vacation spot have been ongoing for years, with greater than 100 areas initially expressing curiosity in internet hosting Sundance. From a closing shortlist of three candidates, Boulder in Colorado beat out rival bids from Utah’s Salt Lake City and Ohio’s Cincinnati.
Boulder, a small metropolis of 100,000 individuals, a brief drive from Colorado’s sprawling state capital Denver, will host the Sundance Film Festival starting in 2027.
“Boulder is an art town, tech town, mountain town, and college town. It is a place where the Festival can build and flourish,” mentioned Amanda Kelso, Sundance Institute Acting CEO, in an announcement.
“Change is inevitable,” Redford mentioned within the assertion. “This transfer will be sure that the Festival continues its work of threat taking, supporting modern storytellers, fostering independence, and entertaining and enlightening audiences.
“I look forward to seeing what the future holds for the Festival there,” he added.
Boulder had broadly been seen as the favourite from the ultimate shortlist.
Unlike Salt Lake City, it’s situated in a liberal, Democratic state. And in contrast to Ohio, Colorado borders Utah and shares its dramatic mountain skylines.
Sundance is a key launching pad for the careers of lots of the business’s main filmmakers. Over the years, roughly 4,000 characteristic movies have been offered in Park City.
These are primarily impartial motion pictures from upcoming administrators, although over time the competition has drawn extra Hollywood A-listers and studios too.
Beloved movies that first launched at Sundance embody Quentin Tarantino’s debut film “Reservoir Dogs,” Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” and Damien Chazelle’s “Whiplash.”
Other well-known Sundance premieres have included Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood” and “Before Sunrise,” and Steven Soderbergh’s debut “sex, lies and videotape.”
This coming January’s Sundance competition, as a result of happen January 22 to Feb 1, would be the closing version held within the unique host metropolis.
© 2025 AFP