Indiwire party turns claustrophobic

10 p.m. Thursday: Sundance on Thursday night. Just got back to the condo from an Indiewire party, which was a small condo full of about 120 filmmakers and fellow festival programmers.

I spoke with Dan Mirvish, the co-founder of Slamdance, who has a film in development and is searching for financing. Then I met Cevin Cathell, the former programmer of Santa Barbara Film Festival , who now programs the Jackson Hole Film festival and Andrew Rogers, the executive director of River Run Festival in Winston Salem.

Finally had to duck out when I was feeling claustrophobic. We had to walk nearly a mile down a snow-laden road with fur trees flocked with snow and Christmas lights all around. Then back on the shuttle to our condo. We are all getting to bed early tonight so that we can catch earl morning screenings which begin at 8:30 a.m. — Jody Kielbasa

Jody Kielbasa at the Sundance Film Festival

3 p.m. Thursday, Jan.19 — I arrived in Park City for the Sundance Film Festival yesterday afternoon with Sarasota Film Festival Director of Programming Tom Hall and Holly Herrick.

It's cold, very cold with the temperature dropping to minus 3 below last night. Very cold for a Florida boy born and raised ... in fact, it's the coldest temperature I have ever been in. There is snow everywhere with dump trucks passing us by taking the snow away and the slopes are jammed.

We are here early to get settled in and get prepared for the festival. I will wear two hats this year ... one as Executive Director of the Sarasota Film Festival watching as many films as I can get to in my seven days here, taking meetings and attending events and parties.

My other hat is as a first time co-producer of a film having its world premiere at Sundance starring William H. Macy, Meg Ryan, Elliott Gould, LL Cool J and Jason Ritter. The film premieres on Tuesday in the largest theater at Sundance with more than 1,500 seats. Executive board member Keri Nakamoto, my business partner and producer of the film, is out here as well and a number of investors from Sarasota and Bradenton are flying in over the weekend to attend. Cadillac is throwing the after party and the hope is that the film will sell at a good price. The buzz is that this year it's a seller's market at Sundance because of the writer's strike and we hope that helps us out. Oh yeah, I forgot ... I'm actually wearing a third hat out here ... it's a black wool ski cap that keeps my ears warm.

Tom, Holly and I picked up our press and Industry badges today which gives us access to press and industry screenings and then we went to the main box office to pick up additional tickets to public screenings. This is an Industry festival and the general public is often on the outside looking in. It's cold, wet and snowy and even the parties are filled with filmmakers and stars in ski parkas and jeans instead of glamorous gowns and tuxes.

Although the Festival opens this evening with a screening of "In Bruges," my Festival will begin Friday morning at 8:30 a.m. in a relatively small screening room watching "A Good Day To Be Black and Sexy."

Today we are huddled up in the condo where we are staying, going over the film lineup and trying to determine what to see and when to see it. We will travel to screening on a shuttle that loops to several theaters that are not true movie theaters, but are actually temporary theaters inside a racquet club, a library, a hotel and a high school performing arts hall. — Jody Kielbasa, Sarasota Film Festival executive director