..Leonard Klady
..David Poland
..Ray Pride
..Patricia Vidal

This year's opening night at Sundance had the feel of something different. For one thing, there were two opening nights for the first time ever. One was in Salt Lake City, as per tradition, and the other was in Park City, where the vast majority of the festival action is.

Traditionally, whether intentional or not, opening night has always been "good for you, but not good for distribution" fare. I don't know how good Chris Eyre's Edge of America, which seems to qualify in the "good for you" category, is. But that was in Salt Lake City on Thursday night. Robert Redford and Festival Director Geoff Gilmore were both here in Park City to kick things off.

The film that was selected for the Park City premiere was Stacy Peralta's Riding Giants, his follow up to the much revered Dogtown & Z Boys. It's a surf doc, playing on the title's pun, very much in the style and spirit of Peralta's debut.

The film is sure to be picked up eventually, though it is not a sure bet as anything more than a niche hit amongst surfers. Artisan's Step Into Liquid managed almost $2 million at the box office and this film might have a slightly higher profile… but $5 million in domestic gross would be a small miracle.

The film is based around a number of quantum leaps in the sport of surfing and the men who led the way towards them. So, the long board leads to the lightweight fiberglass board leads to Gidget leads to pipeline surfing leads to one location of a bigger wave after another leads to Jet Ski assisted surfing leads to one real weird wave.

The characters along the way are a mixed bag, with hipster Greg Noll, now an older but still rawly witty man, leading the way as the movie star of the group. The interviews are interesting and the storylines are compelling, but there is not the driving beat that you need in a great audience doc.

I wonder whether the film could be edited into a much better movie. My guess is, "yes." And I would bet that whoever picks the film up will force an edit of 20 minutes or so.

Peralta's groundbreaking editing style with Dogtown really brought a history made mostly of still images to life. But more importantly, he also had a clear and compelling story with which to work. His story in Riding Giants is compelling in clumps, but there just isn't a reason to take the ride with these men, in the fullest sense. If you feel the surf and smell the sea and get thrilled with the notion of all that coolness, you'll fall in love with the film. But as a guy who likes the ocean, but does not bleed for it, it was just enjoyable. And compared to a film like Touching The Void, it was little more than a lightweight diversion.

As an opening night, the film was a pleasure, more fun than lecture and the audience had a good time, though there was a little restlessness towards the end.

The welcoming speech by Mr. Redford was a bit of a mess, though he did push the themes of the work ahead of the business repeatedly. He made no references, oblique or direct, to the Peter Biskind book or the wildly unnecessary L.A. Times story about the failure of the Sundance Theaters by John Horn this morning. This is, after all, the 20th festival under Redford's guidance and he sees many good things in the rear view mirror and some real hope for the future. Any reasonable person would.

ANOTHER DOC I saw on tape on Thursday was Jean Michel Roux's Investigation Into The Invisible World. And while the film will always be more an anomaly than anything else - selling a film in Icelandic is a brutal thing - it was entertaining as hell, in a creepy, funny, you've-almost-got-me-believing-this-crap kind of way.

The invisible world of the title is the world of elves, gnomes, ghosts and monsters amongst other "unseen people" who inhabit Iceland… or as the film would have you believe, inhabit the whole world, but are more easily seen by the Icelandic people.

The film makes an interesting companion piece to Dirty Work, as two films about true believers who live slightly beyond the range of our comprehension. It's easy to separate the inevitable friends and foes of these films. If you can't find some interest or bemusement at the sight of a man trying to capture a bull's semen in a bag that looks much like a cake decorating frosting bag, you will not like Dirty Work. And if David Lynch doesn't make you smile - not stimulate your intellect, but make you smile - Investigation of The Invisible World will not be very good for you. But they were both quite fun for me.

 

- by David Poland