34 INDIES MAKE SUNDANCE CUT.

Byline: Hollywood Reporter

From a staggering 600 submissions for its independent feature films competition, the upcoming Sundance Film Festival has selected 34 indie films - 18 features and 16 documentaries - to compete for the festival's prestigious, and often career-catapulting Grand Prize.

The annual festival, considered the premier independent film festival in North America, will kick off Jan. 16 in Salt Lake City with a world-premiere screening of Miramax's ``Brassed Off,'' a British film about a mining community's struggle to survive and the resiliency it receives through its brass band.

In all, 127 feature-length films will unspool at Sundance, including 71 world premieres and 34 U.S. premieres.

After the opening-night gala, the festival will, as usual, move to the nearby resort town of Park City and continue through Jan. 26 with its ever-eclectic array of presentations, tributes, screenings and, of course, the feature competition.

If last year is any indication, sideshows - such as restaurant confrontations between angry distributors vying for the same films - may also be a Sundance sidebar.

During the course of the fest, Tim Robbins will be honored with Sundance's annual Pieper Hiedseck Award for career achievement. The actor-writer-director will be honored with a selection of his films. The festival will also recognize the films of German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder with screenings of several of his most-revered works.

``This festival is more cerebral that the last several years,'' Sundance director Geoff Gilmore said. ``Although the competition films may not have as much commercial potential as last year's crop, distribution deals are not our main goal. We've never selected films just for commercial consideration, but rather we've chosen them for their quality and unique voices.