Boys Don't Cry among Sundance highlights in new DVD
set

Giving a nod to the Sundance Institute's 25th anniversary, an 11-DVD collection of festival favorites is being readied for a November 22 release. "Sundance Film Festival Collection: Celebrating 25 Years of Sundance Institute" includes 10 movies plus an additional disc of interviews, behind-the-scenes shots from the Sundance Institute labs, and footage from the Sundance Film Festival.

Films that will be part of the collection include Stephen Soderbergh's sex, lies and videotape, which won the Audience Award at the 1989 Sundance Film Festival; Kevin Smith's cult favorite Clerks, winner of the Filmmakers Trophy at the 1994 festival; The Usual Suspects, the acclaimed thriller from out director Bryan Singer that premiered at the 1995 festival; Smoke Signals, which was developed by Chris Eyre at the 1995 Sundance Institute Filmmakers lab and won the Audience Award and the Filmmakers Trophy at the 1998 festival; and the Sundance Film Festival's 1999 Grand Jury Prize winner, American Movie, from director Chris Smith.

Also featured in the collection are the Oscar-winning Boys Don't Cry (1999), developed by queer filmmaker Kimberly Peirce at the 1997 lab; Todd Field's critically hailed In the Bedroom, for which stars Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek were given Special Jury Prizes at the 2001 festival; 2002 Grand Jury Prize winner Real Women Have Curves, from director Patricia Cardoso, which also garnered Special Jury Prizes for Lupe Ontiveros and America Ferrera; 2003 Grand Jury Prize winner Capturing the Friedmans, the acclaimed documentary from director Andrew Jarecki; and another 2003 Grand Jury Prize winner, American Splendor, helmed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini.

Special features on the bonus disc include interviews with Sundance founder Robert Redford; a documentary on the Sundance Institute; filmmaker interviews; and scenes from the Sundance lab sessions for two films included in the collection. The boxed set will include a booklet with an introduction by Redford and a review of the institute's work in independent film, film music, and theater. (Thomas K. Arnold, via Reuters)