For one thing, the film festival is featuring more environmentally focused films than ever before — not an entirely new concept, as you might recall a little film that premiered there in 2006, called An Inconvenient Truth. This year, out of the 32 films competing, five are focused on the environment. And those five were chosen from more than 50 environmental films that were submitted, which was a huge increase.
Of course, these eco-friendly flicks brought with them some green star power — Sting and his wife, Trudie Styler, were there for the premiere of Crude, a documentary about the 15-year battle over oil contamination between Chevron and the indigenous tribes in Ecuador’s Amazon. Oh, and The Stings weren’t on their own — they were joined by a number of native Ecuadorians and leaders from Amazon Watch. Ben Affleck is also showing up for his film, Reporter, about the crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Aside from the films, there’s one other major environmental initiative — Sundance is seriously reducing the number of plastic water bottles they’re handing out. By teaming up with FilterForGood, the festival intends to “reduce the need for 50,000 bottles of water at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and … be completely bottled water-free by 2010.”
It’s not all crunchy and kosher, though. Due to the number of stars who fly in to the festival by private jet, Sundance is second only to West Palm Beach, Fla., as a top eco-unfriendly private jet destination. I mean, what’s the deal — can Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher really not handle sharing a plane with Paris Hilton, Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon? Okay, bad example — I wouldn’t want to share transportation with Paris, Mariah and Nick, either. Still, you get the point.
Additionally, even though they might not be handing out tons of disposable water bottles, a huge amount of waste is still produced at all of the parties and events, and a huge amount of electricity is required to power the festival. One nice note, though — according to a sign at a central gathering place, “Electricity used for all venues and theaters is offset by clean, renewable wind energy” from wind-powered electricity provided by Rocky Mountain Power’s Blue Skies program.
Still, I love the fact that this festival is making the environment a star on its own. The thing is, there are always going to be festivals and events like this, so while it might not be entirely environmentally conscious by nature, maybe Sundance will encourage some of the stars with clout to make other events a little greener. Could we be seeing a solar-powered Oscars ceremony in the coming years?