Flannels, puffer jackets and celebrities, but no Redford

Parties and panels and studios and streamers and schmooze as the Sundance Film Fest opens in person for first time since the pandemic shutdowns

A first for Sundance: Robert Redford was nowhere to be found.

Having founded the seminal film fest back in 1981 — amidst the sugary spires of Park City, Utah — one could always count on a sighting of the legendary actor-activist and boomer beefcake. For the first time, however, he was MIA (though his soothing voice did flood the beginning of every movie, every unspooling, an omniscient Redford welcoming film-lovers back in person for the first time in three years, as we “relight the marquee at the Egyptian Theatre,” the most famous emblem of the festival).

An era passing? Redford is 86, after all, and he also suffered a major personal blow last fall when he lost a son to cancer.

A first (for me) at Sundance: my wrist making a point of sending me a “noise notification” while at one of the many after-parties that took over this veritable Whoville days ago. Apparently, it was past 100 decibels and, well, “long-term exposure to sounds at this level can lead to permanent damage.” Sheesh. Sundance-ing in the era of the Apple Watch! It happened while I was at a thing for the indie “Magazine Dreams,” about a bodybuilder played by a pretty great Jonathan Majors. A party hosted by Chase Sapphire, where a dude named DJ Spider had seemingly taken me to “the other side.”

Hardly the end of the racket, I can confirm. The buzz, deafening, too, as a new crop of movies, and attendant celebs, aimed here to make their respective plays. Main Street: a catwalk of parkas as film nerds and chapsticked hipsters (it gets pretty dry up here) flocked. Beanie-hatted stars sometimes wandering by ( wait … is that Tiffany Haddish?), while a barrage of brands took up makeshift residence in many of the storefronts (a Canada Goose here, an Audible there). Parties and panels and studios and streamers and schmooze.

Movie-wise, my own Sundance commenced with a trio of docs. The first: the much-anticipated Michael J. Fox movie “Still,” directed by the Oscar-winning Davis Guggenheim, with an overcome Fox taking to the stage afterwards for a panel. Not a dry eye, I tell ya! The movie: one of the best celebrity portraits ever put to screen, I will contend. Funny and frank, saltysweet. Beginnings and endings, unconditional love and your own body betraying you.

Directed with panache, too — in part, using clips and dialogue from Fox’s body of work to tell his reallife story. “I was the prince of Hollywood. I was bigger than bubble gum,” as the Canada-sprung actor intones. Until he was not. Until his diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease handed him a fresh destiny. “I love my mind. I love the places it takes me,” he also mused.

Back to back, in the same Eccles Center theatre, I got my tush in seat for “Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields,” the new close-up of the star.” Also channelling the 1980s and 1990s, during her height, it was most interesting in the way it unpacks the Lolita culture with which the Brooke brand was sold early on. How her life was affected by being the daughter of an alcoholic parent (a stage mom, at that). A revelation of a rape by an industry bigwig, her friendship with Michael Jackson, a tempestuous first marriage to Andre Agassi. So much!

Incidentally, George Stephanopoulos and his wife, Ali Wentworth (both friends) co-produced the film, who later joined Shields onstage.

My third and final doc that day? A covert project called “Justice” via “Bourne” director Doug Liman. Announced just one day earlier, it zeroes in on the allegations that surfaced against Brett Kavanaugh during his Supreme Court hearing and adds new shading. Let’s just say: it was the only Sundance flick I got to that was surrounded by armed guards, complete with sniffing dogs. The whole vibe: intense. And it being the one and only screening, many actual ticket-holders were turned away because so many “red pass holders” (VIPs, industry vets) turned up for it.

The days at the fest folded into one another. Movie. Movie. Party. Party. Movie. Some of the more high-profile premieres I got to included “Cat Person,” an adaptation of the famous New Yorker story, starring Emilia Jones and Nicholas Braun (confirmed: he remains very tall). Caution: this is the latest, greatest entry into the gender wars! The horrors of modern dating! Not sure if it entirely works, but one thing that I am certain of after seeing it: it will be massive water-cooler when it comes out, the subject of a trillion TikToks and think-pieces.

Another one that had audible gasps from the audience: “Eileen,” with Anne Hathaway and Thomasin McKenzie. Think: shades of “Carol,” but more twisted. Hathaway, who plays a 1950s prison psychologist, seemed to be channelling her inner Jessica Lange to me, but in real life showed up in a sleek Versace puffer jacket (with built-in corset) and chunky, bondage-giving boots. When in Sundance …

“Past Lives.” Two thumbs and two toes up. Basically, the KoreanAmerican answer to the Richard Linklater “Before” trilogy. All wrong place, wrong time and full of longing. “Fair Play.” A psychosexual thriller, set in the taut world of hedge funds. Starring Phoebe Dynevor — Daphne from “Bridgerton” — it actually amounted to the subject of the biggest buy at the fest, Netflix forking over $20 million for it. A Judy Blume documentary? Yes, you heard me. After 80 million books sold, the 84-year-old tells her own story. It is titled “Judy Blume Forever” and I found it just wonderful.

Have you really Sundance-d if you have not seen Jason Momoa in a giant cotton candy-hued faux-fur coat? That is how the star showed up for his premiere and, later, during the hijinks at a Tao club pop-up. Dakota Johnson, alas, was seen at a party that Gucci hosted one night for the documentary “Invisible Beauty.” It was a flannel-heavy party. Again: when in Sundance …

Finally, do mark it down: “Flora and Son.” An absolute crowd-pleaser, courtesy of “Once” director Jack Carney, it gave me my one absolute you-had-to-be-there moment when the audience burst into a crescendo of unison clapping to a song in the movie toward the end. Hoots and tears alike.

Starring Eve Hewson(daughter of Bono, in a star-making role) as a single Dublin mom and Joseph Gordon Levitt as her online guitar teacher based in L.A., it tracks their virtual bond. The movie essentially about screens and “being seen,” our broken selves and the power of music. All very humane and fantastical at the same time — just like this awesome, inspiring, if Redford-less, Sundance.