BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Film buffs in this area have faithfully followed Barry Levinson’s career for as long as he has faithfully chronicled Baltimore in his movies. And for the 65-year-old screenwriter, producer and director, that’s been since 1982, when he wrote and directed “Diner” — the first of three films set in his hometown in the early 1960s. The Forest Park High graduate earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Screenplay for “Diner,” which included in its cast Mickey Rourke, Kevin Bacon and Daniel Stern.

More Charm City movies followed: “Tin Men” in 1987, which starred Richard Dreyfuss and Danny DeVito as two feuding aluminum-siding salesmen; “Avalon” in 1990, which portrayed the struggles of an immigrant Polish-Jewish family at the beginning of the 20th century; and “Liberty Heights” in 1999, a coming-of-age story anchored in anti-Semitism and segregation.

No doubt his biggest screen success was “Rain Man” in 1988, starring Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman. Among the movie’s four Academy Awards was a Best Director Oscar for Levinson.

Equally at home on television, Levinson put his hometown on the small screen with “Homicide: Life on the Street,” which ran from 1993 to 1999 and earned him an Emmy for Best Individual Director of a Drama Series.

His latest movie — “What Just Happened?” — was featured at the Sundance Film Festival, which wrapped up Sunday. Starring Robert De Niro and featuring Sean Penn, Bruce Willis and John Turturro, the film tells the tale of a movie producer overwhelmed by deadlines, crazy actors, ex-wives and drugged-out directors. The comedy is based on real-life producer Art Linson’s book, “What Just Happened? Bitter Hollywood Tales from the Front Line.”

The obvious question: Why Sundance for somebody of your caliber?

The movie [“What Just Happened?”] was done independently. It’s a non-studio film from beginning to end, so this is one of the places where you look for distribution.

Do you expect much of a problem with that?

I wouldn’t, but who knows? My main thing is to make a movie that I want to make, try to fashion the material, bring the right elements together and hope for the best.

Why was this the movie you wanted to make?

Because the material speaks out to something I understand. I liked the characters. I liked the sense of desperation.

That sense of desperation, is that your view of Hollywood?

No question. There’s a lot of money at stake. It’s a high-stakes poker game.

What was the biggest challenge of trying to pull off a film like this?

[It’s a] combination of logistics in terms of cost. You have to find the right kind of ensemble, and you need some actors who are going to be big enough to play some of these roles. You can’t be making a movie about a Hollywood producer who’s successful, [then have him] making a movie with an unknown actor. It has no credibility. If Bruce Willis doesn’t play Bruce Willis, there’s no credibility to it. You have to get names, and you have to get names who are willing to work for one-twentieth of what they could get paid.

What was your biggest struggle with this movie?

I don’t know if there was any one thing. There are always a lot of things. If you knew exactly what you were supposed to do all the time, it might not be any fun.

There’s a lot of talk, certainly at Sundance, about new technology and shorter films. How do you see that impacting the industry? Good or bad?

There’s no bad to it. We’re looking at basically a revolution that is beginning now — the fact that anybody can get hold of a camera cheaply and tell a story and that there’s [going to be] a way to distribute that story, whether it’s in a movie theater or on the Internet. The fact that there are outlets that are growing, growing, growing, there’s no negative to that.

What can you tell people who aspire to be actors or directors or producers?

The first advice is to get it onto film. Tell the story any way that you can possibly get it accomplished. Do you have to come to Sundance? Yes, and not necessarily. There are people getting attention off of YouTube.

Do you have any other Baltimore films in mind?

I have one more to go at some point. “Sixty-six,” based on the book I wrote [a novel The New Yorker called “a sequel of sorts to the film ‘Diner’ ”]. Somehow I’m going to try to get that done. Right now it would be considered too expensive, but I’ll have to figure out a way to do it. That would be like the final chapter.

A lot of your films are about the halcyon days of Baltimore. What do you think is the city’s biggest loss?

The deterioration and neglect by the government of the people. Baltimore had an incredible school system. It was very, very good. It was a very well-run public school system. It was allowed to deteriorate. To basically take away the future from so many children, that is one of the great losses.

When you were a kid, what director really spoke to you?

I didn’t go to see anybody because I didn’t know anything about directing. Saturday morning we went to the Ambassador Theater, and it didn’t matter what was playing, we just went. I had no awareness of directors. I think my first attention [to directing] was “On the Waterfront,” and that turned out to be Elia Kazan. There were some things going on that seemed so interesting to me — those little, tiny human touches. And I remember suddenly in that movie, maybe the first time, I was aware of something that I found fascinating.

Is there any actor from cinema’s past that you wish you could have worked with?

Humphrey Bogart. I would have liked that.

Coming tomorrow

It’s the Sundance, hon, as the Baltimore connection takes a back seat to no one at this year’s highly acclaimed film festival.