Robert Redford’s annual Sundance Film Festival kicks off on Thursday with Hollywood stars including Matt Damon joining relative unknowns in celebrating the best in independent cinema. Yet on the eve of the festival, the 64-year-old Spy Game star made a very non-Hollywood declaration, saying: “I’m not a face-lift person”.
“I am what I am. I’m not jumping on the bandwagon and turning the clock back with a face-lift,” he says. “So what if my face is falling apart? I don’t give a damn. Anyway, it gives me character.”
“Everyone thinks they can stay young forever,” says the Oscar winner, who believes plastic surgery is the resort of the “vain and insecure”. “Everyone in Tinseltown is getting pinched, lifted and pulled… The trade-off is that something of your soul in your face goes away… People should preserve their time in history. I’m happy to make the best of what I’ve got.”
The Way We Were star has established himself as much more than a blond heart-throb, taking home an Academy Award for directing Ordinary People and single-handedly reviving independent cinema in the US. In 1980 he established the Sundance Institute, a year-round workshop that nurtures young talent far from the glow of LA.
This year the fest welcomes a mix of established Hollywood properties, including Jennifer Aniston in The Good Girl and Robin Williams in the eagerly-anticipated dark drama One Hour Photo, and a host of edgy up-and-comers.
Matt Damon returns to the festival’s host venue, Park City, Utah, with Gus Van Sant’s Gerry, a flick he co-wrote with actor Casey Affleck and Gus.
Last year’s festival launched Christopher Nolan’s noir thriller Memento and the gut-wrenching drama In The Bedroom – two films on countless Top Ten lists for 2001. This year it may yet again mark the emergence of other major talents.
“The one thing that is consistent, is that Sundance is hard to predict,” says Patrick Gunn, executive vice president at Aristan Entertainment.
For more on Robert Redford click here for HELLO!'s profile on the celebrated actor and noted philanthropist.
Photo: © Alphapress.com
Photo: © Alphapress.com
