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The feature debut by 26-year-old writer/director/editor Steven Soderbergh galvanized the independent film movement of the late '80s and '90s with its breakout success leading out of the Sundance Film Festival. Soderbergh's late twentysomethings are so alienated and sexually dysfunctional that voyeuristic, videotaping onanist Graham's professions of relative healthiness ring ironically true. In these warped lives, the mediating presence of the video camera becomes a means to self-awareness, yet human connection can happen only via a machine. Winner of the Audience Prize at Sundance, sex, lies and videotape commanded international attention by winning the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival (as well as the Best Actor prize for James Spader's subtle performance as Graham), setting the stage for the award-winning prominence of American independent cinema at the Cannes festival in subsequent years. Picked up and aggressively marketed by Miramax, sex, lies and videotape grossed 26 million dollars, raising the bar for an "indie" hit, establishing Miramax as the most prominent purveyor and savvy marketer of independent film, and refocusing attention on non-Hollywood product as a vital creative and entertainment alternative to blockbusters.