Slamdance gearing up

For 12 years, Slamdance Film Festival officials have done everything in their power to point out the differences between their movie-premiere event and the competing Sundance Film Festival. Which makes it somewhat ironic that next year's Slamdance features films with themes similar to 2007 Sundance selections — specifically, religion and war.

This week, the festival "by filmmakers, for filmmakers" announced its slate for the 13th annual event, which runs Jan. 18-27 in a variety of Park City and Salt Lake City locations. Included are 29 movies, 20 of which are competing for narrative-feature and documentary-feature awards.

Slamdance's Opening Night Gala will feature the premiere of "Weirdsville," a screwball/occult comedy that stars Scott Speedman, Wes Bentley and Taryn Manning.

They're not the only name actors whose works are in the festival, though. Campbell Scott leads the cast of "Crashing," Dermot Mulroney and James Cromwell star in "Dante's Inferno," and "Homo Erectus" features Ali Larter, David Carradine and Gary Busey.

Highlights of the narrative competition include the drama "Bangkok," about a soldier searching for his MIA father, and the undead comedy "American Zombie."

"Children of God: Lost and Found" examines the controversial Children of God church and is one of the documentary-competition selections.

According to Peter Baxter, Slamdance's president and co-founder, the upcoming programming "represents the spirit of the Slamdance ID." "This 13-year-old breaks rules, has stayed true to its roots and embodies the spirit of independent creativity," Baxter said, adding that the films also offer "a high level of entertainment, social and commercial value."

New Slamdance events this year include a late-night film series (for patrons 21 and older) and the horror-screenplay competition.

For more information, go online to www.slamdance.com. Festival passes ($350 to $150 ) are currently available, and individual tickets ($11) go on sale online Saturday at www.slamdance.com/2007/festival/tickets.asp.

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E-mail: jeff@desnews.com