The independent spirit that Robert Redford intended when beginning the Sundance Institute and the Festival continues, but in many ways the biggest threat to its purity lies in its success. The Sundance organizers have done a fantastic job organizing the Festival and lining up sponsorships, but be prepared to shell out some bucks if you’re visiting.

Unless you’re wealthy, you’ll really need to do some heavy planning to take full advantage of the Festival. I can’t say that I succeeded at that--I basically donated at least $50 worth of unused tickets to the Festival alone through lack of foresight and other factors. Most of the Sundance Festival takes place in the ski resort hamlet of Park City, so it would be advantageous to secure housing there, but that isn’t cheap. Some avid patrons have actually purchased condominiums there, and rent them out during the year, outside the time that they are going to attend the Festival. As fanatical as that sounds, it may be the most economical way to take in the 10 day Festival if you plan on being a regular. The non-Festival rates for the local hotels are pricey, but doesn’t knock your socks off at around $150 a night, but double that rate and add a hundred or so for the 10 days that Sundance rolls into town. Thus, you have a couple of choices: gather a group to split the bill or prepare to commute 40 minutes from Salt Lake City (in good weather).

I chose the cheaper digs of Salt Lake City, which also grants the possibility of a few Sundance screenings as well, and has a wider variety of restaurants with a new complex near the Delta Center. A disadvantage I found was the idea of dragging myself out of bed early in the morning to drive through fresh snowfall to get back up to Park City after a late night there. After an interminable 140 minute Korean documentary consisting of way too much narration and repetitious “talking heads” that lasted until midnight, I just couldn’t face that early morning drive this past Friday. Fortunately, I was able to catch one of the better documentaries that evening in Salt Lake City.

The Sundance Festival web site is pretty helpful, as far as giving out information about the various events and films. They even have a section of “how to Sundance,” which is helpful to a degree. However, remember that Sundance is essentially a business organization striving to generate more income for their projects. That brings me to the various packages, ticket procedures, and how to avoid inadvertently donating more money to the Festival than you really plan to (like I did).

Depending on your endurance level, it’s simply not possible to satisfactorily take in all the Sundance movies, but you must be the judge of what your body can endure. I figure that I can generally handle three screenings per day before turning into Jell-O, but can possibly extend that to four movies if the third and fourth are both good quality. In festivals where first time and unknown filmmakers are participating, the odds of each film being high quality isn’t all that high—not even at Sundance. That’s why I chose to screen mostly documentaries since I figured that even the mediocre films would teach me something—I’ve watched enough of those on the History Channel.

So, look closely at the package deals the Festival advertises and determine whether this is your best bet. The documentary package that most appealed to me was for a “mere” $400, which would allow me to see 19 documentaries over five days, as long as I could get from screen to screen. The mathematics of that boggled my mind, and I knew that my brain would likely turn to mush after the second day on that kind of schedule, and that averaged out to better than $20 per film. Not a good financial deal, though I did discover that using the Wait Line can really suck.

If you’re not purchasing one of Sundance’s overpriced passes, you’re inevitably going to experience the Wait Line since individual tickets for the hottest films are almost certain to be sold out. You can also try hitting the box office the day of the show to see if anyone’s turned back tickets, or may luck out by running into someone selling a ticket to a screening they aren’t going to—always a good thing to do when you find yourself with an unwanted ticket, and you have the time to sell it. Most of us peons are destined to master the Wait Line procedure. For most films, you can get in by lining up 90 minutes to 120 minutes before the screening, where they will give you a number an hour before the film, allowing you about 30 minutes to run for coffee or a quick bite. That means you’re out of luck if the film is playing at the Eccles Center since it’s isolated, but your odds of getting into the screening are likely better there since it’s one of the larger venues. Conversely, the Holiday has the smallest theaters but is conveniently next to Albertson’s to satisfy hungry Wait list movie buffs.

Your odds for getting into a popular screening through the Wait Line are very slender if you don’t arrive at least 90 minutes ahead; therefore, you’ll not get into consecutive screenings without solid tickets. This year, I had no chance to see the drama with the most audience buzz: Napoleon Dynamite. It was screening at noon, but I couldn’t get to the Eccles Center until 11 A.M. after watching an awesome documentary about Metallica, and the Wait line was overwhelming. Best bet for those attempting to economize is to pick a handful of “must see” films and do what you can to get regular tickets, and use the Wait Line procedures for the films you can’t get tickets to. But even that is no guarantee. This year, the biggest documentary buzz was for Super Size Me (essentially a film that takes up some of the themes of Fast Food Nation, where the filmmaker severely damages his health by dining exclusively on McDonald’s), and the talk had swelled so much about the film that absolutely no one on the Wait Line got into the Friday evening screening—that had to bum out the guy holding on to ticket #1!

The biggest doofus thing I did that guaranteed losing money came from my online purchases. I got in there the very first day the Sundance web site opened for individual ticket selling, and of course the site continually crashed and wonked out on us. By the time I finally got in, I was so excited that I began filling up my schedule with about 10 films. They didn’t conflict with each other in time; however, the Sundance site was not specific enough for neophytes about the logistics of place. So, I arrive in Park City a half-hour before my first screening at 1 PM, and of course have great difficulty finding a parking place. But that was no matter because the Sundance Screening Room (where that first film was showing) isn’t even in Park City--it’s at the Sundance Institute another hour away from Park City! I then discover that there’s another film I’d rather see at 3:30 than the one I have a ticket for, so I decide to use the Wait Line successfully to view Heir to an Execution. I’m looking forward to seeing Home of the Brave at 6 PM; however, it is physically impossible to do so when it’s screening in Salt Lake City. Besides, I have a 9 PM ticket for a Russian documentary. OY!

So, of my first four tickets purchased online, I used just one. But as they say, “live and learn,” and I talked to a half dozen other Festival goers who had also made the same blunder their first time. I’ll be better prepared for future excursions to Sundance, but wise readers will take at least one lesson from this: be sure to pay attention to BOTH time and place when scheduling your Sundance screenings in advance! But movie buffs really should make at least one "pilgrimage" to Sundance. In spite of some blunders and throwing away some cash unnecessarily, I still was able to check out some very good films that may be months away from theatrical release or may never make it to the big screen.