NoDo you think that we, the troops that today embarked on the Intercity (subjecting to the police checks and filings which, already in Milan, concern only passengers on trains heading to the French border), we are people detached from the world. That for two weeks we will divide ourselves between the dark rooms and the lights of beach parties (they rarely invite us), that we will spend on the street of the lifeWhy real life always enters the cinema, it shows up at festivals (more easily it crashes) and it is almost impossible not to deal with it.
Johnny Depp and Maiween in Jeanne du Barry.
After a canceled festival in 2020, a convalescent and summer edition in 2021, the largest cinema event in the world had begun to register already last year a beginning of renaissanceand it is almost certain that the expression “back to normal” will be one of the refrains of the edition that opens tomorrow.
In Cannes, where the 4,000 accredited are joined by an army of 12,000 Industry, i.e. buyers and sellers of films (who spend – he did the math Le Monde – between 30,000 and 150,000 euros each to be there and the game seems to be worth the candle), where a second festival is being played in the basement of the Palais between the stands of production and distribution companies, there was almost never anything normal. But beautiful and very ugly, on the other hand there has always been a lot.
Catherine Deneuve is the symbol of Cannes 76.
Tomorrow night Clare Mastroianni the architectural barrier that the festival has chosen as its symbol will risethe montae de marches, to open this 76th edition in her role as godmother. If she will look up from the forest of flashes she will see the gigantic image of her mother, Catherine Deneuve: a photo from the end of the 60s that portrays Bella during the day is the poster of the festival. To be registered immediately among the beautiful things.
Cannes like Versailles
The film that opens the dance is Jeanne du Barry by Maïwenn with Johnny Depp as Louis XV. The film was shot in the Palace of Versailles, which is a bit of a double of the Cannes festival with its exclusive hierarchies, private screenings and workers banned from the Croisette by decree (demonstrators against the pension reform They won’t pass!, a protest march hoping to steal some reflected light was diverted to Boulevard Carnot, not far away but outside the bubble, in dim light).
The Versailles court of Louis XV – Johnny Depp
The mirror game doesn’t end there. Johnny Depp e Maiwenn they are both figures of light and shadow. Johnny has recently emerged victorious (at least from a criminal point of view) from the public trial against his ex-wife Amber Heard, accused of defamation against him. Dirty clothes washed in prime time. Which they paid for. A well-known perfume brand has deemed that his image is still worth 20 million (a three-year contract, well over the 7 million agreed by Brad Pitt for the competition).
Maïwenn and the attack on a journalist
The director for her part will have to answer of the attack on Edwy Plenel, owner of Mediapart, grabbed by the hair in a Parisian restaurant and covered in spits. His case is still open, for now Maïwenn prefers not to talk about the matter, but the attack could have been caused by the press campaign that Mediapart made against Luc Besson, her ex-husband (married at 16 and father of her daughter Shanna) and accused of rape by a model. Complaint for which there was a non-suit to proceed. Maïwenn had defended Besson on that occasion.
Anathomie d’une chute by Justine Triet.
Not even a week will have passed and the Cannes public will be able to see the images of Anatomies of a chutei.e. “anatomy of a fall”, i.e. the story of the public carnage of a couple that takes place in a courtroom. Directs Justine Triet, ofwhich we had already seen The Battle of Solferino (in the sense of the street, rue Solférino, in Paris, former headquarters of the socialist party), which this time seems to have been inspired precisely, during the writing, by the Heard-Depp trial. All eyes are on German actress Sandra Hüller (good, we saw it in Meet Tony Erdman) which will also be in the highly anticipated The Zone of Interest by the American Jonathan Glazer.
The selection presents no major surprisesthe artistic director Thierry Fremaux has focused on big names and regulars: the Austrian Jessica Hausner (Club Zero), the Finn Aki Kaurismaki (Fallen Leaves), the Americans Wes Anderson (Asteroid City) and Todd Haynes (May December)the Japanese Hirokazu Kore-eda (Monsters), the Italian trio Nanni Moretti (The sun of the future), Marco Bellocchio (Kidnapped) and Alice Rohrwacher (The Chimera). In the end Wim Wenders, Palme d’Or in 1984 with Paris, Texas, will return with perfect days. And Ken Loach, two-time winner, will lead on the Croisette The Old Oak. It seems that the English filmmaker, always very modest, reacted to the director’s invitation by exclaiming: “But are you sure?”.
The French patrol
In the French patrol, in addition to Triet, we will see again Catherine Breillat with L’Eté dernier and the French-Vietnamese Tran Anh Hung, already Golden Lion in Venice in 1995 with cyclo, here with La Passion de Dodin-Bouffant, Juliette Binoche and Benoît Magimel protagonists. Only one documentary in the main competition, Youth by Wang Bingthe Chinese author who will also present a second film in the special screenings, Man in Black. Few first worksthere are eight in the Un certain regard section, including that of the Mongolian director Zoljargal Purevdash, If Only I Could Hibernateby the Sudanese Mohamed Kordofani, Goodbye JuliaAnd Augur by Baloji Tshiani, rapper from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Only one in the main competition, Banel & Adamaof the French-Senegalese Ramata-Toulaye Sy.
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