SVA alumni are headed to Park City, Utah to screen new work at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, taking place January 16 – 26. Lynn Shelton (MFA 1995 Photography, Video and Related Media), director of the critically acclaimed films Your Sister’s Sister and Humpday (which won a Special Jury Prize at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival) has a new movie, Laggies, premiering at the fest. Starring Keira Knightley, Chloë Grace Moretz and Sam Rockwell, Laggies tells the story of a 28-year-old woman who, after panicking when her high school boyfriend proposes unexpectedly, forgoes attending a professional-development retreat to hide at the home of her new 16-year-old friend and her attractive, single dad.
SVA alumnus Dustin Grella (MFA 2009 Computer Art) is creating new Animation Hotline videos live in the Sundance House. Attendees can leave a message on the blue Animation Hotline “Hotspots” that will be placed around the festival. The Hotspots are television-telephone combinations that allow viewers to watch previous Animation Hotline videos and, if they feel so inspired, pick up the attached phone and leave a message of their own. Messages that are chosen to be animated will then be put back on the televisions (as well as online at animationhotline.com) to be viewed.
At the 2014 Slamdance Film Festival, also in Park City, Utah and running concurrently with the Sundance Film Festival, Bill Plympton (1969 Cartooning) premieres his latest animated feature, Cheatin’ (watch a trailer below). Funded by a highly successful Kickstarter campaign (and fitting for a fest that honors independent films), Cheatin’ is a tale of love, jealousy, revenge and murder, and inspired by the work of James M. Cain (Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice).
For more information about the films and the festivals, visit sundance.org and slamdance.com.
Images from top down: A still from Laggies; Animation Hotline Hotspot.