How have the priorities of the Sundance Film Festival shifted over the years? The answer isn’t abstract. It has nothing to do with the “spirit” or the “mission” of the festival (face it, good filmmakers find a way to make their movie regardless of festival support ... Sundance just makes the process tipsier and more profitable). But neither has the festival lost its way, like you’ll hear everyone at every goddamn bus stop in Park City say -- not because the festival isn’t totally sort of creepy and corrupt feeling, but because Sundance never really had a "way" in the first place.

The problem most people have with Sundance is usually that it’s become “so mainstream” now, but this logic presumes that Sundance was some towering beacon of indie pride in the past, and that’s just probably not true. Sundance has always been a brand that supports other brands, either by providing much-desired indie approval, or, more often nowadays, by providing the backdrop for a big, wobbly ten-day industry retreat (why do you think people give away so much free shit?). This kind of I-scratch-your-back-you-invest-in-my-festival behavior makes sense, whether people like it or not. It’s good business. But good business makes for odd artistry. So far I’ve met nine people in “industry finance” and one in actual filmmaking (and I think he was a liar).

The evidence of Sundance’s gradual slide into commerce is everywhere. For example, last night’s completely packed Kenneth Cole Black/Gen Art Party at the Sky Lodge. Or rather, technically, “The Kenneth Cole Black/Gen Art Party with Kenneth Cole, Nick Cannon, Kevin Bacon, John Krasinski, Alan Cumming, Anne Heche and many more, presented by Greenhouse and 360 Eco-Luxury Vodka.” Without even walking into the party, the names are dropped. You’re advertised to. This is just how it is. The question becomes, how do you feel about knowing you’re being sold? Because the Gen Art party was fun.

There was literally champagne in the bathrooms! It did everything it was supposed to do: entourages mingled, celebrities were interviewed and documented for posterity, namesake vodka was poured, the lines outside grew until just before midnight. The party’s adopted film was buzzed. It was the kind of party where all you hear are bizarrely mysterious fragments of conversations all night -- walking past that other kid from Napoleon Dynamite, I seriously overheard, “... no man, like, projectile. P-r-o-j-e-c-t-i ....” Point is, if the night’s a success, who cares whose name is on the walls? Sundance has always been financed by someone, it’s just that now those someones are making their presence a little more apparent. And you can complain, but you bought in knowing the score. This is what you came here for: not the films (you can see them later in theatres anyway), but the spectacle. And so far, Greenhouse, Sky Lodge, and their ilk have managed the spectacle spectacularly.