Although I had reported, a few times already, that Boulder was the chosen candidate, and that it’s been the dirty little secret in Hollywood for almost six months now, we finally received official confirmation today that the Sundance Film Festival is indeed moving to the Rocky Mountains of Colorado.
Reps for Boulder came up with a big tax credit rumored to be around $34M, and a plan to have a more centralized festival as is the case with Telluride, Toronto and Cannes. The result is that they will now host the most important film festival for independent cinema in the world.
Call me a purist, but I’m disappointed that Sundance is moving out of Park City in two years. Those sh*tty little theatres, like The Egyptian and Library, were always part of the charm of attending the fest. Ditto the shuttle buses that painstakingly took you to these locations.
Boulder does make sense though. It’s a serene locale, set in the Mountains, of comparable size to Park City. It’s also way more accessible with more actual direct flights to the region, whereas Park City does not have an airport.
Sundance founder Robert Redford also has close ties to Boulder — he attended university there — and worked as a janitor at a local restaurant — before heading to Hollywood for his acting career. His son Jamie and daughter Shauna also both graduated from the university in 1985.
The fest has been taking place in Utah since 1985. The 2026 edition will still take place in Park City, but it looks like that’ll be the last one. I’ll probably be attending, for old times’ sake.