Beyond the Multiplex

Every Cannes jury has distinctive characteristics; if last year's was loaded with star power (headed by Wong Kar-wai, it included Samuel L. Jackson, Monica Bellucci, Tim Roth and Helena Bonham Carter), this year's jury exuded seriousness and avoided the limelight. Asian superstar Maggie Cheung was the only true A-list celebrity on the panel, although the well-loved French actor Michel Piccoli probably qualifies as such on the Continent. Frears' other colleagues included Italian director Marco Bellocchio, Canadian actress and director Sarah Polley, Nobel-winning novelist Orhan Pamuk, Australian actress Toni Collette, Mauritanian director Abderrahmane Sissako and Portuguese actress Maria de Medeiros.

Always a crusty personality, Frears was glib and totally unforthcoming when reporters tried to press him on the films the jury ignored. Asked twice what he thought of the Coens' "No Country for Old Men" (probably the consensus favorite among journalists) he quickly grew testy: "It's a terrific film. I could sit here all night and tell you I think it's terrific. What do you want? It's dreadful. Awful. We hated it." And what about Javier Bardem's acclaimed performance as a Terminator-esque hit man? "He's a very good actor. Why didn't we give the award to Javier? Because he owes me 500 pounds. Look, at the end of the day you give it to one person, that's all."

Finally, Michel Piccoli, one of the great charmers of French screen history, came to Frears' rescue (or to ours) with a burst of uncharacteristic candor. While the 2006 jurors loyally claimed their choices were unanimous, Piccoli made it clear there were disagreements. "It's impossible to have nine people who all think the same thing about such delicate decisions," he said. "We listened to each other, and everyone defended the ideas closest to our hearts. We all had our own ideas about who should win the prize. I'm not going to talk about the films that disappointed us strongly, but you can figure out which films those might be."

Indeed we can. Along with the Coen brothers' film and Fincher's "Zodiac," the disappointments included new pictures from some of the most respected names in world cinema. Béla Tarr's "The Man From London," Kim Ki-duk's "Breath," Catherine Breillat's "Une Vieille Maîtresse," Alexander Sokurov's "Alexandra" and Emir Kusturica's "Promise Me This" all went conspicuously unmentioned on Sunday night, even by a jury that was seeking to honor challenging, nonmainstream fare. I haven't seen "Breath" or "Alexandra," and the other three deserve more attention than I can give them here. Still, if the jurors found them flawed works that don't represent those directors at their best, they're probably right.

When Cristian Mungiu, the 39-year-old director of "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days," finally took the podium with his Palme d'Or, he proved to be a likable and level-headed fellow, seemingly unruffled by the media maelstrom. In striking contrast to Schnabel, he fielded questions eloquently in both English and French. Asked how he would celebrate that night, he pointed out that he wasn't likely to run wild on the Croisette, since he was in Cannes with his wife and kids. Gesturing to his cinematographer and co-producer, Oleg Mutu, he said, "We don't live like artists, to be honest. We are our own producers, accountants, secretaries and drivers. We were financing the film while I was rewriting the script and we were casting."

This evening in Cannes was "the best thing ever to happen to Romanian cinema," Mungiu said, adding that without the previous success of directors like Puiu and Porimboiu, he wouldn't be here. Asked what winning the Palme d'Or means, he joked, "I hope it's not the best day of my career. I hope to make many more films, and I hope other things will happen to us later." Like winning an Oscar? "No. This is much more important than the Oscars. That's about something else. This is the ultimate recognition that you are really a filmmaker."

* * * * For more coverage of the Cannes Film Festival, click here.

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