No exit

Leaving a Sundance movie early is considered about as socially acceptable as e-mailing in the middle of a film: Almost everybody does it, so why not? The problem comes when you try to duck out halfway through a movie only to find the film’s producer guarding the exit like a sentry at the gates of Guantanamo Bay.

“Why are you leaving?” producer Igor Kovacevich politely asked as I tried to walk out of a screening of his “Downloading Nancy” at the festival’s Racquet Club screening room this morning. The possible answers were numerous:

I didn’t really want to see Maria Bello cut herself with a razor anymore.

I'd had my fill of Jason Patric's putting out a lighted cigarette on Bello’s body, or his snapping a mousetrap on her bare toes.

I didn’t really want to find out how badly Rufus Sewell would continue to pummel Patric with a golf club.

I unfortunately had a (nonexistent) other movie to get to.

Of course I chose the last option, and Kovacevich and I had a nice chat about his film and his working with the actors. In a few minutes, the trickle of walk-outs grew more steady, and I wished Kovacevich good luck as I made my way out.

But at 45 minutes of “Downloading Nancy,” I'd stayed longer than at others. The fastest I have ever left a Sundance movie is a record I can safely say will never, ever be broken. It was the 1994 festival, and I was sitting at the Holiday Village Cinemas waiting for the documentary “Boxer Rebellion” to begin. The film was preceded by an insufferably bad short called “Independence Day,” but as soon as the lights came up between the short and the documentary, the director of “Boxer Rebellion” decided to offer a little pre-screening pep talk.

“A lot of people who saw my film yesterday were really angry,” she said, “so I have prepared a treatise explaining what I am trying to do.” It wasn’t so much that she had pronounced the word tree-tyce, as what the self-important document said. After taking one look at her memo, before a single frame of the movie was projected, I walked out. People who stayed behind said it was very much a good decision.

--John Horn

(Photo: Maria Bello in "Downloading Nancy," courtesy Sundance)

Comments

[Tom S]

45 minutes?

It's disappointing that after only three days of travelling around a scenic western ski town, being ushered into the press tent, then to your seat and having to watch films all day you were too exhausted to spend the full 96 minutes required to watch the entire film of Downloading Nancy.

I managed to get myself to the screening and stayed until the end. Even after flying across the country with my wife and two small children, in economy no less. And as a reward for my time, I was able to make an informed decision about the film's merits – something you were unable to accomplish.

Sadly, the people you cheated by your lack of effort weren't just the film's cast and crew, but your own readers. You decided that they weren't worth the gargantuan effort that staying until the end of a feature length film would have required.

Your lack of effort in doing a job that many people would die for is shameful. If I put the same effort into my job perhaps then I'd have more time to do a job like yours.

I sincerely hope you actually stay to watch all of the other films you review. We'll never know. But we'll wonder.

And if you'd stayed you'd have seen Mr. Sewell feed Mr. Patric some cereal, and not with a seven iron.

[The Mac Man]

You get em Shoey!