The Sundance Film Festival and its mother organization Sundance Institute has been using the Dolores Doré Eccles Center as a venue in Park City for more than 25 years, since it opened its doors in 1999.
This theater is connected to Park City High School and, as such, has led to a long-lasting connection between the school and the film festival.
While most of the festival isn’t geared towards students or even minors in general, Sundance still offered several different student outreach programs.
Students can watch short and feature-length films and participate in Q & A sessions with the directors and makers of those films.
Sundance’s partnership with Park City High has always had the goal of exposing high school students to new artists and teaching them about the filmmaking process, specifically by inviting them to talk to people involved in making the films, such as the directors, actors, or producers. Sundance has tried to use the program to inspire the next generation to get involved with the arts, whether that is filmmaking or other arts.
Park City High film director Kyle Fish has seen firsthand the influence that the Sundance programs have had on his students.
“Sundance has definitely had a strong influence on inspiring students in my program to see possibilities for themselves becoming filmmakers in the future. I have students every year that go on to film school and beyond, with many of them being inspired by the Sundance program.”
Fish also talked about what it’s like to work with the Sundance Institute.
Because Sundance has such a high expectation of itself and how it presents itself to the community in general, the program does an exceptional job of providing films that are high quality and age-appropriate, as well as relevant to student interests, he said.
When asked about the impact of Sundance leaving Park City, Fish talked about how much of a positive impact that he’s seen Sundance have on the community.
“While a lot of locals are bothered by the increased congestion during Sundance, I do think it has had a positive influence on Park City as a community, and the raised level of interest in filmmaking as an art.”
Fish said he hopes that the community of Park City will maintain the sense of connectedness that Sundance brings.
“I hope that the town doesn’t lose that excitement about film and filmmaking, because that culture of filmmaking has opened a lot of doors with local businesses, and things that would open up their facilities up for students to use for their creative work, that otherwise they maybe wouldn’t have been as interested in.”
Because the film festival is leaving Park City, its partnership with the school has also come to an end.
“I specifically will miss the Filmmakers in the Classroom program, which is the shorts program that takes place right here (in the school). And we’re the only high school that gets that. Like, there are other programs that other Utah schools can participate in, but the Sundance Institute brings those filmmakers right to us.”
On the opposite side of things, Sundance has always enjoyed working with students. The Institute is always grateful for the feedback that Park City High School students give to the filmmakers who come and present.
Fish mentioned how appreciative they are of students’ questions, saying, “They’ve always said that our questions are the most insightful and raw, and that’s really encouraging because that means that the students are really engaging with it directly.”
He continued, explaining that Sundance hopes to continue offering student art services online in the future, even though the festival itself will be located in Boulder, Colorado.
Fish is grateful for the festival.
“I want to say thank you to the Sundance Institute for bringing this cultural event to our town and giving our students access to this art form in a way that they otherwise would not be able to access. One of the most impactful things for my students, I think, is hearing the filmmakers tell the stories about why they made the films they made, and how their own personal life inspired the art, or a story they heard, inspired them to make this film. And so to see the artist behind the art gives those students a much deeper experience of getting to receive that message and really interact with the movies in that way.”