By Gregg Goldstein

Robert Redford acknowledged the elephant in the Egyptian Theater Thursday afternoon during his 25th annual Sundance Film Festival press conference: the current global economic meltdown. He offered Obama-style hope, but no concrete answers for nervous filmmakers and execs. "Obviously the economic climate issue is giant," he said. "How its going to affect the festival, I can't say. In terms of overall, I guess it gets down to art, and art's relationship with society, and art's relationship with subsets of society like economics. Art will always find a way. I'm a firm believer in not only the strength of art but the importance of art.

"We're looking at a world now that's very very screwed up, but there are a lot of opportunities that come along with that," he said. "The part that obviously has our businesses in turmoil right now ... how people are going to adjust to it is one thing. But clearly distribution is the key. Distribution has been the one problem for filmmakers for a long time now, particularly independent filmmakers because it's very hard for them to compete with studios who put $40, $50, $60 million dollars into an opening weekend, but they've somehow managed to work their way through, kind of like grass growing through a sidewalk."

Fest director Geoff Gilmore was similarly vague on possible solutions to the obstacles facing indie film, but in all fairness, it's neither man's job to help the industry make money with the fest. (The inclusion of star-filled fare, while no guarantee of financial success in the arena, at least draws a media spotlight and industry execs to some deserving films.) After plugging Sundance Channel as one possible revenue stream for films, Gilmore offered one more suggestion. "I want to say that the internet is going to be one of the solutions, but it's not going to be the only solution."