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Unknowns, veterans to premiere films at Sundance

Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival is always aiming to discover new talent — and letting established talent try something different.
Film Sundance
In this film publicity image released by The Sundance Film Festival

PARK CITY, Utah — Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival is always aiming to discover new talent — and letting established talent try something different.

The premier U.S. showcase for independent cinema, the festival opens Thursday, loaded with A-list actors from hit TV shows and big studio flicks branching out to low-budgeted films, whether on-screen, behind the camera or both.

Far from corporate Hollywood, Sundance remains a place where unknowns and veterans can premiere films side by side.

Among the nearly 200 feature and short films playing during the 11-day festival are directing debuts from Philip Seymour Hoffman with the romance Jack Goes Boating, in which he co-stars with Amy Ryan; Mark Ruffalo with the faith-healing drama Sympathy for Delicious, reuniting him with You Can Count on Me co-star Laura Linney; and How I Met Your Mother star Josh Radnor with the ensemble comedy happythankyoumoreplease, co-starring Malin Akerman.

Canadians with films at the festival include Sarah Polley (starring in the sci-fi horror flick Splice), Adriana Maggs (director of coming-of-age tale Grown-Up Movie Star) and Ryan Reynolds (said to be the only person on screen throughout much of Buried).

“I don’t want to play the expert here, because I am a novice in this world of being a writer-director,” Radnor said. “But I had some talks with people who represent me, who said there’s still no better place for American independent film than Sundance. That it’s still an amazing place to debut a film after all these years.”

A timely story of corporate downsizing marks the big-screen directing debut of TV maestro John Wells ( ER, The West Wing), whose The Company Menis one of Sundance’s high-profile premieres.

The Company Men stars Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Costner and Maria Bello in the tale of a family man whose picture-perfect life crashes down after he loses his job as a sales executive.

The story was inspired by a job loss in Wells’ own family, but he talked with many others in the same boat as unemployment soared during the recession. Rather than spinning a dreary drama, though, Wells aimed to capture the resilience that hard times can foster.

“It actually has, I think, a very uplifting message. It’s about these things we think are going to kill us, and they’re actually things that make you stronger somehow,” Wells said. “We imagine that our jobs define us, and the loss of a job is a death. I think at least for many, many of the people I’ve spoken to, that’s the fear, and the reality is something actually very different.”

Other TV veterans with films at Sundance include The Sopranos co-stars James Gandolfini and Edie Falco.

Reuniting with writer-director Eric Mendelsohn, who directed her in the 1999 Sundance entry Judy Berlin, Falco stars with Embeth Davidtz and Elias Koteas in 3 Backyards, a drama that unfolds among suburban residents on a single day.

Falco said she hopes the Sundance exposure will help Mendelsohn land a theatrical deal for 3 Backyards, the sort of gentle, personal story that blockbuster-minded studios overlook.