PARK CITY — It's a perfect fit.
The Sundance Film Festival this year is promoting the notion of "cinematic rebellion."
Sundance, meet "Howl."
One of the first films to premiere this week during the 10-day festival was the movie "Howl," based on an epic poem that is described as "a shock to the system in the midst of the grey flannel, Eisenhower '50s" that helped usher in a "cultural shift."
The film's cast, directors and producers gathered to talk about the Allen Ginsberg poem that, when first published in 1956, sparked a firestorm of controversy involving the First Amendment and the question of, "What is literature?"
The original publisher of the poem was arrested and charged with selling obscene material. There were cries of censorship as people objected to the steamy, raucous and rebellious content of "Howl."
The movie adaptation of the ensuing trial and the times during Ginsberg's rise in popularity stars James Franco as the young Ginsberg, David Strathairn, Jon Hamm, Bob Balaban, Alessandro Nivola, Treat Williams, Mary Louise Parker and Jeff Daniels.
After the premiere, a few audience members, apparently about 20 years old, came up to director Jeffrey Friedman and said they were "blown away" by the film.
Friedman and others are hopeful a younger, perhaps more open-minded audience will give the movie traction. Producer Christine Walker described the film as part animation, live action, documentary and courtroom drama.
Regardless of how the movie is regarded, festival director John Cooper and the filmmakers are confident or at least hopeful that "Howl" will at first gain, however slowly, an audience of primarily younger crowds who might be interested in the generation of so-called "beat" poets that gave birth to the likes of Ginsberg. That attraction to beat poets is what Franco said Friday originally drew him to the script.
"I think the slow and steady, almost subversive ways, in a way, is the way to do it," Cooper said about how "Howl" will evolve in popularity and acceptance. "You gradually break down barriers — and it's really the youth that's going to take this. …
"What Sundance does is make sure that you shine a light on it for a minute so it doesn't disappear."
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