Thank You for Sponsoring

To its credit, Sundance this year rolled out the red carpet for filmmakers whose work fails to flatter a number of the festival's major sponsors, including these four:

L'Oreal. Friends With Money's downwardly mobile heroine (Jennifer Aniston) turns to stockpiling free samples of skin care products (and so can you!).

Starbucks Coffee.The British Black Gold sternly points the finger at multinational java giants for exploiting Ethiopian farmers. But the livelier buzz-kill comes in the short doc Preacher With an Unknown God, whose holy man turns a serving counter at Starbucks into a pulpit, calling on the congregation to "neutralize this cash register now!"

Volkswagen. A clutchless VW camper van epitomizes "indie" resilience in Little Miss Sunshine (which sold for enough to buy 400 Passats), though the maker of the fest's "official vehicle" is among the suspects in Who Killed the Electric Car?

Fox Searchlight Pictures. This Film Is Not Yet Rated, Kirby Dick's raucous assault on the MPAA and the studios that support it, climaxes in the brazen identification of clandestine appeals-board members—including a top Searchlight exec whose "gotcha!" outing drew gasps and giggles from the press screening crowd.