Andy Bilchlbaum and Mike Bonnano travel the world posing as representatives of Halliburton, HUD and the WTO as the Yes Men in their film at Sundance.

So many movies, so little time. Posters plaster the walls at Sundance in an attempt to attract a large crowd--the trick is to be the last one to put your poster up.

I was there for the second wave of the festival that started after Obama’s inauguration. Exhilaration was in the air along with hope and warm and fuzzy feelings that made the Sundance experience really special this year. And maybe less than the normal challenge, because “working” Sundance is fun but hard. Because of trying to shoehorn everything into a 24 hour day (midnight screenings, early morning meetings, bus trips, slogging through snow and black ice), basic human needs such as food, water and sleep are often at a minimum. Everyone is watching, promoting, developing, networking, organizing and discussing films so you tend to forget about lunch. But anyway, as a wimpy Californian it wasn’t too snowy this year and I had fewer waves of panic at the sight of black ice. The Sundance survival kit this year included cute green Nalgene water bottles and hand warmers.

Caroline Libresco from Sundance organized industry meetings with filmmakers and industry professionals where I got to meet with international filmmakers and talk about projects in development. I had great conversations with filmmakers Hubert Sauper (Darwin’s Nightmare), Havana Marking (Afghan Star), Christo Hird and Rupert Murray (End of the Line), NC Heikin (Kimjongilia), John Dower (Thrilla in Manila) and Ngawang Choephel (Tibet in Song). Thanks to Sundance for connecting industry documentary people with these filmmakers––it’s a good thing.

Since I’m at the festival mostly looking for projects in development and to talk with producers, watching films is more of a treat than a priority. But I got to see some wonderful features, such as the heart-warming Amreeka (a project in development by ITVS-funded filmmaker Cherin Dabis) and the odd and funny Brief Encounters with Hideous Men, based on the book by the late David Foster Wallace.

As for docs, I went to a screening of the premiere of The Yes Men Fix the World. The Yes Men are two guys who plan and execute hilarious hoaxes aimed at the corporate world. Andy Bilchlbaum and Mike Bonnano travel the world posing as representatives of Halliburton, HUD and the WTO. In their most famous hoax, Andy posed as a Dow Chemical spokesperson (“Jude Finisterra”). On the anniversary of the Bhopal disaster––an industrial disaster that took place at a Union Carbide, a chemical plant in the city of Bhopal, India––Andy promises that Dow will dissolve their company Union Carbide. With the 12 billion dollars from the sale, they’ll clean up the site and provide medical care for the thousands of victims of the Bhopal chemical spill. The news reaches millions of viewers before the BBC discovers it was all a hoax and the Yes Men are exposed. Dow suffered a great plunge in their stock and felt an enormous backlash from the stunt. The film is filled with other pranks but also has fun sequences of the Yes Men in their power suits strategizing in a barn/office, lovely shots of them synchronized swimming and creating and crafting their props. The young and energetic audience gave the Yes Men a standing ovation after the film, relishing their latest “hoax of hope,” a fake edition of The New York Times (dated July 4, 2009) with the headline “War in Iraq Ends.” A total of 1.2 million copies of the fake paper were distributed, including at the screening, where we read about “Maximum Wage Law Passes Congress” and “All Public Universities To Be Free.” A fitting sign that the Yes Men are the social issue tricksters in the Era of Obama.

-Claire Aguilar, ITVS vice president of Programming

Lois Vossen, vice president and series producer, catches up with colleagues and friends while at the Sundance Film Festival, including Lauren Prestileo of WGBH-Boston.

After six days in Park City it is time to head home. This year marked my 18th consecutive Sundance and in many ways it was my best Sundance experience in years. The warm weather certainly helped––I only wore my gloves twice, my hat once and never even used my scarf!

The smaller crowds made catching the endless round of shuttle buses more enjoyable. As a proponent of mass-transit, I kind of enjoyed riding the shuttles and eavesdropping on all the conversations. While some of the comments were pretty wild, I also (over)heard some of the most intelligent discussions about film as the shuttles lumbered from the Transit Center and Main Street to the library, to the Yarrow/Holiday Cinemas and onto the Eccles.

But appropriately, the best thing about this year’s Sundance was the films. I saw 15 films and really liked many of them and loved a few of them. The bounty of environmental films could have made for a very depressing Sundance––especially since I screened The Cove, The End of the Line, Crude, No Impact Man and Dirt! The Movie within three days. But even the most dire of these films tried to offer the audience a ray of hope if we are willing to change our ways. Like the call from President Obama, we’ll have to make some sacrifices like giving up blue fin tuna so it doesn’t go extinct. But before I can taste some dirt in my own Oakland backyard like they did in Dirt! The Movie, I’ll have to remove the lead.

One of the fun things about Sundance are the chance encounters: running into former colleagues I see once a year or every few years at Sundance, meeting filmmakers whose work I’ve admired and being able to tell them that in person, going to a pub for lunch and getting seated down the table from the five documentary competition jurors so you can say hi to all of them at once, and of course meeting new filmmakers.

On Tuesday morning I participated in the “Meet the Commissioning Editors” pitch meetings at the Sundance House. One person who joined my table is a Sundance Fellow this year. His earlier short was featured as part of the Independent Lens Shorts Festival. He pitched his new project along with about 30 other filmmakers looking for funding, broadcast and other support.

A notable difference from earlier years at Sundance is whose sitting in the theater with me watching documentaries. This year I sat behind, next to, in front of or across the aisle from Sting, Trudie Styler, Chris Rock, Pierce Brosnan, Kevin Bacon, Ben Affleck, Nia Long, etc. And of course Mr. Redford, but he’s been doing it for 25 years.

- Lois Vossen, vice president and Independent Lens series producer