Sundance Film Festival: Old stars still glimmer for S.L. opening

The weather around the valley seemed unsettled and undecided. Snow, ice, blowing cold — there was a little of each of them.

The forecast for the 2010 Sundance Film Festival on Friday, though, was starry. Especially in Salt Lake City, which saw some good old celebrities.

Seventy-something Robert Duvall, 60-something Sissy Spacek and 50-something Bill Murray were in town for the opening of the festival's Salt Lake programming, which included the premiere of the drama "Get Low."

The film is a 1930s-era fable about a hermit (played by Duvall) who wants to pay for his funeral — and an accompanying "funeral party" — while he is still alive. (Murray plays a local funeral director; Spacek, one of the hermit's longtime friends.)

All three actors were at Rose Wagner Center, posing for photos and answering questions on the red carpet before the first of two showings of the film that night.

Spacek, a Sundance veteran, said she was "happy to be in one of her favorite places" and to be in the film, which had her "arm-in-arm with Bobby Duvall" part of the time and "sharing time with Billy Murray" at other times.

And Duvall, who returned to Sundance for the first time in nearly two decades, said he was grateful for a role that "really spoke" to him.

"That's a good thing, because my character doesn't talk a whole lot in the movie," he chuckled.

Murray is a newcomer to Sundance. While he was hobbled and on one crutch, he still joked with the press. When asked about the quality of the film, he quipped, "Hey, I just make the movies. I don't make value judgments on them." (He was smiling as he said that.)

All three actors were joined by the film's director, Aaron Schneider, who said he was "thrilled" to be part of a star-studded premiere.

The event was a decided change from last year's more low-key and low-wattage gala, which featured the fashion documentary "The September Issue" and had a nearly celebrity-free red carpet.

In recent years, the festival has tried to bolster its Salt Lake presence, holding a separate gala the night after its big Park City premiere. (The latest edition of Sundance actually opened Thursday, with screenings of the competition features "Howl" and "RestRepo," and a shorts program.)

Festival director John Cooper calls Salt Lake City a "growth area" for Sundance, which is bursting at the seams in Park City.