I Sell the Dead by Glenn McQuaid
The 15th Slamdance Film Festival will take place in Park City, Utah, from January 15-23.
Utah?? The Prop. 8 Mormon State??
To the best of my knowledge, Slamdancers haven't been attacked by those who have been going for the throat of Sundance festival organizers. Perhaps the fact that calls for a Slamdance boycott would have attracted considerably less media coverage has something to do with it.
In any case, Slamdance 2009 will screen approximately 100 films, with 20 of those in the narrative and documentary feature competition categories, which are supposed to showcase films without domestic theatrical distribution and budgets under $1 million, from first-time feature directors. Unlike at Sundance 2009, chances are you won't find motion pictures starring Susan Sarandon, Pierce Brosnan, and other top names in the Slamdance competition.
The 15th Opening Night Film is I Sell the Dead, a horror/black comedy written and directed by Glenn McQuaid. The film stars Dominic Monaghan, Ron Perlman, Angus Scrimm, and Larry Fessenden, who also produced it. Set in the late 1800s, I Sell the Dead follows a couple of graverobbers who begin to unearth some unusual corpses.
In addition to the five programming sections — Narrative Features, Documentaries, Special Screenings, Twilight Screenings, and Shorts — Slamdance 2009 will also present four writing competitions: feature screenplay, teleplay, horror screenplay, and short screenplay; the Anarchy Online Short Film Competition; Fireside Chats; a $99 Special short film production project; and, for the first time, music videos.
Slamdance and its box office will be headquartered at the Treasure Mountain Inn, 255 Main Street, the Festival's base since 1998. For more information and for a complete listing of screenings, visit www.slamdance.com or call 323/466-1786. Festival passes are now on sale on the web site; individual tickets go on sale online December 16.