SUNDANCE 2014

Sundance Adds Zach Braff's 'Wish I Was Here' & 'Clerks' Anniversary

by Ethan Anderton
December 18, 2013

Nearly the entire line-up for the 2014 Sundance Film Festival has already been revealed including the Premieres for narrative and documentary films, the Spotlight and Park City at Midnight programming, and the official in-competition selections. However, a few more additions have been made. Today Sundance announced that they've added Zach Braff's sophomore directing effort, the Kickstarted feature Wish I Was Here, to the Premieres category. In addition, Sundance is also including a new From the Collection category that will feature 20th anniversary screenings of Clerks and the documentary Hoop Dreams. Both films premiered at the 1994 Festival, which will be the subject of “Class of ’94,” a Power of Story panel.

Here are the two official additions to the 2014 Sundance Film Festival (as of December 18th):

Premieres:

Wish I Was Here / U.S.A. (Director: Zach Braff, Screenwriters: Zach Braff, Adam Braff) — Aidan Bloom, a 35-year-old struggling actor, father, and husband, is still trying to find purpose in his life. In coming to terms with the death of his father, Aidan and his family unite to discover how to turn the page onto the next chapter. Cast: Zach Braff, Kate Hudson, Mandy Patinkin, Josh Gad, Ashley Greene, Joey King.

From the Collection:

Clerks / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Kevin Smith) — One wild day in the life of a pair of overworked counter jockeys whose razor-sharp wit and on-the-job antics give a whole new meaning to customer service! Cast: Brian O’Halloran, Jeff Anderson, Marilyn Ghigliotti, Jason Mewes, Lisa Spoonauer.

The other From the Collection title is Hoop Dreams, the film directed by Steve James that chronicles the lives of Arthur Agee and William Gates, two inner-city teenagers from Chicago. Through their skills on the basketball court they struggle to escape their surroundings and realize their dreams of making it to the NBA. It won the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival, became an Academy Award nominee for Best Film Editing and was added to the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry in 2005. Working from multiple elements, including standard definition video masters and a 35mm film print, a project team created a new uncropped, high definition digital master that better represents the pictorial quality of the original videography, so this will be a very special screening indeed.

For those who don't know, The Sundance Collection at UCLA (The Collection) is a film preservation partnership established in 1997. The Collection is specifically devoted to the preservation of independent documentaries, narratives and short films supported by Sundance Institute and has grown to nearly 2,300 holdings representing 1,800 titles, including recent additions such as El Mariachi, Winter’s Bone, Paris is Burning, Johnny Suede, Working Girls, Crumb, Groove, Better This World, The Oath and Paris, Texas. Titles are generously donated by individual filmmakers, distributors and studios. So if you can't get into any of the star-studded premieres, these screenings of old favorites aren't bad either.

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