Seven films represent Scotland at last Redford Sundance festival

He was the original Sundance Kid, who set up a festival in his home state of Utah.

Robert Redford died in September last year but the Sundance Film Festival he established in 1978, continues to thrive. Next year, it will expand to new frontiers in Boulder, Colorado.

So this last festival will be a significant one, as it says farewell to its founder and his home turf.

And not least for the Scottish productions headed there next week.

With seven films produced or co-produced in Scotland, it's an unprecedented year according to Isabel Davis, executive director of Screen Scotland.

"We've had good years before, with two or three titles but this is definitely a breakout year," she says.

"Sundance is a global platform for films. It's incredibly influential, with industry eyes on the most exciting new work that's coming out."

Ania Trzebiatowska agrees. As a feature film programmer for Sundance as well as director of the much smaller and newer SANDS: International Film Festival of St Andrews, she's well placed to judge the impact.

"Obviously the heart of this festival is Robert Redford and it has been since the very beginning," she says.

"He managed to grow it from the ground up and there are very few festivals that have the same impact when it comes to what happens to the film afterwards. It's a pretty small slate. You have 10 documentaries in world competition, 10 in US competition, that's not many."

"We usually show about 100 films so seven from Scotland is a pretty good percentage when you think about it with a couple of them on the very first day."

One of those first films is Everybody to Kenmure Street which will premiere in the World Cinema Documentary competition.

Directed by Glasgow-based director Felipe Bustos Sierra and produced by Ciara Barry of Glasgow-based production company Barry Crerar, it tells the story of the standoff between police and protesters after a Home Office dawn raid in the neighbourhood of Pollokshields.

Ciara believes it's a local story which will resonate with an international audience.

"We're sharing the Glasgow that we all know and love with the world and it's a very hopeful and optimistic film and to be able to give an audience something that's light and hopeful and is all about community is joyful," she says.

But she says that Sundance is also about business. Boosting the profile of a small film ahead of cinema release, and selling to as many territories around the world as possible is part of what makes attending important.

Festivals like Sundance and the Glasgow Film Festival where the film will have its UK premiere in February – are both ways to increase their audiences in a competitive market. And square up to the might of much bigger filmmakers with their equally large marketing budgets.

"With everything that's available to watch on the small screen at home, trying to get people out to see your films is a bit of a challenge, so to be able to start the life of the film with a world premiere at one of the top film festivals in the world is pretty special," she says.

Other Scottish films include The Incomer which will screen in the NEXT programme. Set on a remote Scottish island where two siblings survive by hunting seabirds, it was filmed on location in Caithness, and is the debut feature of Edinburgh-based director Louis Paxton who said he's "thrilled" to share his Scottish comedy with a US audience.

Its Edinburgh based co producer Wendy Griffin is also behind the film Extra Geography, which will have its world premiere at Sundance.

Although set in Lagos, Lady which is written and directed by filmmaker Olive Nwosu was brought to the screen by a Scottish production company Ossian International with the support of Screen Scotland.

Producer Alex Polunin is also behind Filipiñana which is set in an elite country club in Manila and will premiere at Sundance.

Edinburgh-based producer Sonja Henricki is also taking an international story to Sundance with Birds of War.

The love story of a London-based Lebanese journalist and a Syrian activist/cameraman as told through thirteen years of personal archives across revolutions, war and exile it will also have its world premiere in the World Cinema Documentary Competition.

Its directors Janay Boulos and Abd Alkader Habak say Sundance is a chance to launch themselves as independent filmmakers and producers.

"The film is deeply personal, but it speaks to universal themes - love, resilience, and the courage to connect in a world that thrives on division," they say.

"We want this screening to open doors for us to keep telling stories that challenge stereotypes and humanise regions often reduced to headlines."

For producer John Archer of Hopscotch Films it means a delayed debut at Sundance with The Story of Documentary, the third in a series of cinema epics made with director Mark Cousins.

In 2022, his film "My Old School" was selected for Sundance but the pandemic meant the festival was staged online.

"For any Scottish film-maker – or any film-maker – having a film selected for Sundance is the cat's pyjamas, so having The Story of Documentary picked this year is especially pleasing," he says.

"And how great to finally be at Sundance, in its last year at Park City, with a piece of work that celebrates documentaries, a hundred years after John Grierson first coined the word. "

Director Mark Cousins also believes there's never been a better moment for Scottish film to be celebrated at Cannes.

"Sundance has for decades discovered films and asked questions about social justice," he says.

"Now that democracy is being challenged in the US, It feels right that our film about truth and history is there. I hope Robert Redford would think that The Story of Documentary Film is in the spirit of the festival which he founded."

As the sun sets on this year's Sundance Festival, they're preparing for a new chapter in a new location. And while they're still mourning the loss of their founder, there's still a Redford connection in his filmmaker daughter Amy Redford who's on the board.

"She's a huge advocate for independent storytelling and she understands filmmakers because she was one herself," says Ania Trzebiatowska.

"Of course, it will be different, but I think it will also feel like a major celebration of everything that Robert Redford managed to accomplish."