This week, the Sundance Film Festival is celebrating in Park City, Utah, 25 years of activity with a special edition of the event. The festival has become the top gathering for all U.S. independent filmmakers.

One of the conclusions reached by the people involved in the industry is that this is by far one of its worst periods, and the only way to improve the situation is by significantly reducing the production and marketing costs and also considerably decrease the actors’ salaries.   

"The sky did fall. It's fallen a lot," said Mark Gill, chief executive of independent producer The Film Department, in a panel at the festival.

Panel members noted that over the past few weeks, the public embraced art house movies, which had a huge box office success, such as the gay-themed "Milk," ($20 million) and Indian love story "Slumdog Millionaire" ($44 million). These productions proved that there is indeed a demand for good movies that do not necessary need to be released under Hollywood’s rules. The festival managed to promote and encourage these productions, bringing them to the spot light.

"The theater box office seems to be thriving, especially for a number of indie films," said Sony Pictures Classics co-chief executive Michael Barker.

Even though the festival, initiated by Robert Redford, targets independent fiml-makers, over the past few years, the crowds present got more and more diverse, attracting people from the show business such as Paris Hilton, Linda Bollea, Who is Hulk Hogan’s ex-wife, Sarah Larson and Aubrey O-Day.