Salon.com > Cannes Film Festival http://www.salon.com Wed, 19 Jun 2013 02:24:51 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Robin Wright: “There always has been a difficult slot in your late 30s for female roles” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/29/robin_wright_there_always_has_been_a_difficult_slot_in_your_late_30s_for_female_roles/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/29/robin_wright_there_always_has_been_a_difficult_slot_in_your_late_30s_for_female_roles/#comments Wed, 29 May 2013 16:16:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308725 CANNES, France – Robin Wright plays a character called Robin Wright in Israeli director Ari Folman’s bewildering, half-animated science-fiction argosy “The Congress.” It’s certainly tempting to believe that there might be a few elements of autobiography in the character, since the movie’s Robin Wright is a 40-something Hollywood actress who starred in “The Princess Bride” and “Forrest Gump.” (I don’t know whether the movie’s Robin used to be married to Sean Penn; the father of her children is never seen or mentioned.)

Wright looked as if she were on her way to an A-level star career and never quite got there. She’s taken time out to raise her two kids and has a long-standing reputation for being difficult and demanding. Her agent (played by Harvey Keitel) tells her early in the film that she’s got one last chance to save what’s left of her career -- by having herself scanned by the studio's computers and signing over her life rights, so producers can make whatever kind of "Robin Wright movie" they want.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/29/robin_wright_there_always_has_been_a_difficult_slot_in_your_late_30s_for_female_roles/feed/ 5 Cannes: Lesbian sex drama wins Palme d’Or http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/cannes_lesbian_sex_drama_wins_palme_dor/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/cannes_lesbian_sex_drama_wins_palme_dor/#comments Sun, 26 May 2013 21:20:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13309758 In a major triumph for the host nation at the conclusion of the 66th Festival de Cannes – which many observers expected would be dominated by American films – French director Abdellatif Kechiche’s explicit lesbian love story “Blue Is the Warmest Color” won the Palme d’Or on Sunday evening, from a jury headed by Steven Spielberg. This marks only the fourth time a French film has won the Palme, widely regarded as the biggest non-Oscar prize in the global movie business, since the mid-1960s. (Last year’s winner, Michael Haneke’s “Amour,” was officially an Austrian-made film, although entirely shot in France.) It’s also the first time a gay-themed love story has won the Palme.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/26/cannes_lesbian_sex_drama_wins_palme_dor/feed/ 11 First look: Joaquin Phoenix, Marion Cotillard shine in “The Immigrant” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/first_look_joaquin_phoenix_marion_cotillard_shine_in_the_immigrant%e2%80%9d/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/first_look_joaquin_phoenix_marion_cotillard_shine_in_the_immigrant%e2%80%9d/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 18:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13308135 CANNES, France – Immigration is a central theme of American life, and a political issue that never goes away. Whether the constant tide of people who come to the United States from other countries is a pollution of the national essence or a rejuvenating injection of life force is a question we keep hashing out over and over again, generation after generation. In “The Great Gatsby,” the film that opened the Festival de Cannes this year, Joel Edgerton’s Tom Buchanan gives his famous speech about how the “Nordic race” is in danger of being overwhelmed by dark invaders. Hardly anyone would phrase it quite that way today -- OK, Pat Buchanan comes pretty close – but the sentiment lingers in certain quarters.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/first_look_joaquin_phoenix_marion_cotillard_shine_in_the_immigrant%e2%80%9d/feed/ 8 Steamy lesbian-sex movie has Cannes abuzz http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/steamy_lesbian_sex_movie_has_cannes_abuzz/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/steamy_lesbian_sex_movie_has_cannes_abuzz/#comments Fri, 24 May 2013 10:45:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13307581 CANNES, France – Now that the sun has emerged and the promiscuous, unreasonable colors of Mediterranean spring have replaced dingy, drizzly gray, conversations at Cannes have turned to this year’s other big topic: What kind of movie is a Palme d’Or jury headed by Steven Spielberg going to like best? You can certainly make a case for Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s heartwarming family drama “Life Father, Like Son,” the most Spielbergian of competition entries. But whatever you make of his own films, Spielberg is a genuine cinephile; I can just as easily imagine him being swept away by the Coen brothers’ "Inside Llewyn Davis,” Asghar Farhadi’s “The Past” or James Gray’s magnificent, old-fashioned “The Immigrant” (review coming soon!), just to name a few.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/24/steamy_lesbian_sex_movie_has_cannes_abuzz/feed/ 5 Cannes: Ryan Gosling’s new movie draws the boo-birds http://www.salon.com/2013/05/23/cannes_ryan_goslings_new_movie_draws_the_boo_birds/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/23/cannes_ryan_goslings_new_movie_draws_the_boo_birds/#comments Thu, 23 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13306350 CANNES, France – Remember when someone tried to sue the makers and distributors of “Drive” for, I guess, not putting enough driving in the movie? Well, Ryan Gosling and writer-director Nicolas Winding Refn are back with another ultraviolent, ultra-stylized, music-throbbing, male-angsty viewing experience, this time set in the underworld of Bangkok, and that person may want to get the lawyers greased up and ready to go. Potential targets could include anyone in my profession who describes “Only God Forgives” as a thriller, or who tries to characterize its plot by using words like “plot.”

A loud chorus of boos and whistles (mixed with a smattering of applause, to be fair), echoed through the Grand Théâtre Lumière as the closing credits of “Only God Forgives” rolled during Wednesday morning’s press screening. It was this year’s first major appearance by the notorious Cannes boo-birds, and a startling turn of events for one of the festival’s most eagerly anticipated titles, especially given the collective movie-buff orgasm that greeted “Drive” here two years ago. Whether it reflects the world’s final verdict on the movie very much remains to be seen.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/23/cannes_ryan_goslings_new_movie_draws_the_boo_birds/feed/ 8 Cannes: Directing 101 with James Franco http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/cannes_directing_101_with_james_franco/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/cannes_directing_101_with_james_franco/#comments Wed, 22 May 2013 00:01:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13304814 CANNES, France – James Franco hardly counts as a newcomer to filmmaking, having directed at least six or seven features since 2005. (The ambiguity about the exact number comes with something like “Francophrenia,” a film consisting entirely of his appearances on “General Hospital,” which were edited into a spurious narrative, or “My Own Private River,” an art project that repurposes much of Gus Van Sant’s “My Own Private Idaho.”) But there’s no question that the 21st century Renaissance man’s new adaptation of William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying” -- which premiered here on Monday -- marks his debut as a director of serious, art-house-oriented narrative features.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/cannes_directing_101_with_james_franco/feed/ 2 Justin Timberlake: I’m a mediocre folk singer! http://www.salon.com/2013/05/21/cannes_justin_timberlake_and_carey_mulligan_talk_inside_llewyn_davis/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/21/cannes_justin_timberlake_and_carey_mulligan_talk_inside_llewyn_davis/#comments Tue, 21 May 2013 11:45:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13303425 CANNES, France – In the Coen brothers’ new movie “Inside Llewyn Davis,” the unquestioned smash hit of this festival so far, Justin Timberlake and Carey Mulligan play key supporting roles as Jim and Jean Berkey, a folk-singing couple in early-1960s Greenwich Village. Jim and Jean are a bit more clean-cut and success-oriented than their downcast, couch-surfing and considerably more talented friend Llewyn, played by Oscar Isaac in the year’s biggest breakout performance. Llewyn threatens to expose not merely their agreeable mediocrity but also the flaws in their marriage; he has slept with Jean and may have gotten her pregnant. Who’s he going to borrow money from to pay for the illegal abortion? Take a wild guess.

This movie is a delicate balance between comedy and drama, and these characters are, too. Timberlake’s Jim is a genial, basically lovely guy who has the sense that something is changing in New York’s insular folk scene, though he doesn’t quite know what. Timberlake helped compose and arrange the profoundly silly and ludicrously catchy novelty song Jim writes in the movie (“Please Mr. Kennedy”), which will probably earn him more money than Llewyn’s earnest, somber folk-purist approach will earn in a lifetime. Jean, on the other hand, is a ferociously driven woman trapped in the era just before American feminism, when even in the folk-beat world a wife’s role was first and foremost that of servant and helpmeet.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/21/cannes_justin_timberlake_and_carey_mulligan_talk_inside_llewyn_davis/feed/ 4 First look: The Coens’ marvelous folk-music odyssey http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/first_look_the_coens_marvelous_folk_music_odyssey/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/first_look_the_coens_marvelous_folk_music_odyssey/#comments Sun, 19 May 2013 20:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13302860 CANNES, France – On Sunday morning the sun finally came out on the Côte d’Azur --perhaps briefly, and accompanied by stiff winds – and soggy festival-goers finally had a hit movie to celebrate that did not involve Paris Hilton’s shoe collection. Joel and Ethan Coen’s “Inside Llewyn Davis,” which screened for the press late on Saturday and had its black-tie gala premiere on Sunday night, likely won’t reach American theaters until December, so it’s not yet time to write a full-length review. But this mysterious, satirical comedy-drama set in the Greenwich Village folk-music scene of the early 1960s finds the brothers at their richest and strangest, delivering a shaggy-dog parable about the elusive nature of artistic success that’s loaded with colorful supporting characters and pregnant with hidden possible meanings.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/first_look_the_coens_marvelous_folk_music_odyssey/feed/ 3 “Jodorowsky’s Dune”: The sci-fi classic that never was http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/jodorowskys_dune_the_sci_fi_classic_that_never_was/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/jodorowskys_dune_the_sci_fi_classic_that_never_was/#comments Sun, 19 May 2013 13:30:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13302687 CANNES, France – According to “Drive” director Nicolas Winding Refn (who’s also here this year with the ultra-violent “Only God Forgives”), the legendary unmade mid-‘70s film version of Frank Herbert’s “Dune” by Chilean-born mad genius Alejandro Jodorowsky actually exists – and he’s seen it. OK, even Refn hasn’t seen a version of it that can be projected on a screen or played on a high-def monitor, the version that was supposed to star David Carradine, Orson Welles, Mick Jagger and Salvador Dalì. That doesn’t exist. But Refn says he spent a long evening in Jodorowsky’s Paris apartment while the latter went through the storyboards for “Dune” with him page by page, talking through every shot and every line of dialogue. “I am the only spectator who has ever seen this movie,” Refn concludes. “And I have to tell you: It was awesome.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/19/jodorowskys_dune_the_sci_fi_classic_that_never_was/feed/ 39 First look: A Chinese art-house director goes for blood http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_a_chinese_art_house_director_goes_for_blood/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_a_chinese_art_house_director_goes_for_blood/#comments Sat, 18 May 2013 23:45:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13302564 CANNES, France – Biggest, grimmest, most visually impressive and most ambitious of the 2013 Cannes competition films to screen so far, Chinese director Jia Zhangke’s “A Touch of Sin” tells four interlinked stories that add up to a sweeping condemnation of the corruption and amorality beneath China’s economic miracle. Jia is a longtime film-festival fave-rave, known for slow-moving, documentary-style and nearly plotless dramas focused on real life and shot in construction zones, factories, godforsaken rural villages and other places where ordinary people scrape out a living.

“A Touch of Sin” both is and is not like Jia’s other films, which include “Still Life,” “The World” and “Unknown Pleasures,” along with several documentaries. Locations for these four allegorical tales are similarly downscale, ranging from brothels to bus and train stations to beaten-down peasants’ households to a dormitory for industrial workers. And then there’s all the killing. It would be a mistake to advertise this as an action movie – although some American distributor probably will – because it sets up false expectations. But Jia has evidently decided he’s done with subtlety and wants to move to a starker level of metaphor. Drawing on several different spectacular true-crime stories – a relatively new phenomenon in China – he delivers an art-house film with the body count of a “Die Hard” sequel.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_a_chinese_art_house_director_goes_for_blood/feed/ 1 First look: An Iranian director takes on Western morality http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_an_iranian_director_takes_on_western_morality/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_an_iranian_director_takes_on_western_morality/#comments Sat, 18 May 2013 13:25:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13302403 CANNES, France -- By leaving his native Iran (at least for now) and making what for all practical purposes is a French film, Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi may have given up the principal factor that made him interesting to the West. But those who admired Farhadi’s intense Tehran domestic drama “A Separation” – one of the key movies of this decade so far – will find the same intimate sensibility and the same finely-wrought shifts in perspective at work in “The Past,” which premiered here on Friday. It's still too early at Cannes to start handicapping the Palme d'Or race, but this one's sure to be a strong contender.

This time Farhadi's camera is pointed not at the hypocrisies of life in the Islamic Republic but at the darker consequenes of easy-breezy serial monogamy in the secular West. It’s oddly bracing to have an artist come out of a society that we know he finds overly repressive, and immediately make a film that essentially accuses supposedly liberated Westerners of behaving like a bunch of spoiled children, and of poisoning the next generation with our reckless misbehavior. Mind you, “The Past” is a complex drama that can’t be boiled down to that one theme, and anyway the squabbling middle-class couple in “A Separation” inflicted plenty of damage on that adorably precocious preteen daughter of theirs. It’s not as if Farhadi is preaching either morality or religion. Islam played a role in “A Separation” mainly as a marker of class differentiation, and while several of the characters in “The Past” come from Muslim backgrounds, religion is never mentioned.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/18/first_look_an_iranian_director_takes_on_western_morality/feed/ 6 First look: Sofia Coppola’s chilly, brilliant “Bling Ring” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/17/cannes_sofia_coppolas_chilly_brilliant_bling_ring/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/17/cannes_sofia_coppolas_chilly_brilliant_bling_ring/#comments Fri, 17 May 2013 14:40:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13301413 CANNES, France – Somewhere around the third time the gang of reckless kids in Sofia Coppola’s “The Bling Ring” broke into Paris Hilton’s house – and, by the way, that really is Paris Hilton’s house – I had a realization. While I theoretically agree that crime is bad, I actually had no objection to them stealing handbags and watches and dresses and money and (allegedly) cocaine from Hilton. I mean it: I don’t care. It’s not as if Hilton actually did anything to earn all that crap she has in the first place, and she apparently didn’t notice for many weeks that anything was missing! As far as I’m concerned, the envious, Adderall-dosed suburban teens of the Valley can tear down her house with their bare hands and fight over the Gucci scraps. Maybe it’s a juvenile and stupid version of redistributing the wealth, but this is America, a juvenile and stupid country. What can you expect?

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/17/cannes_sofia_coppolas_chilly_brilliant_bling_ring/feed/ 21 Cannes: The 10 hottest movies http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/cannes_the_10_hottest_movies/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/cannes_the_10_hottest_movies/#comments Thu, 16 May 2013 14:28:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13299682 CANNES, France -- A chilly downpour greeted arrivals on the Côte d'Azur this week, with the promise of more un-beach-friendly weather to follow. Parties, interview sessions and other manufactured events were feverishly rescheduled to more sheltered locations. But while the sunny weather and picture-postcard scenery of the Riviera are usually a lot more pleasant this time of year, they aren’t the real reason why the entire film industry descends on this overgrown resort town for 10 days every spring. Now we all have an excuse to head indoors and watch movies.

I’ve already read other critics proclaiming in advance that this 66th Festival de Cannes -- which got underway on Wednesday night with the star-studded but rain-soaked European premiere of "The Great Gatsby," followed by murky midnight fireworks -- will be a memorably great one, with one of the strongest lineups in years. OK, sure, maybe. But more than anything, that’s a film-industry reaction to the fact that this festival has premiered several movies in recent years that made a big impact in America, “The Artist” and “Amour” being the most obvious examples. It’s certainly possible that this year’s festival will produce Oscar-winning films or culture-condensing moments, and a lot of people are looking forward to Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska,” the Coen brothers’ “Inside Llewyn Davis” and “Jimmy P.” -- the first English-language film from the great French director Arnaud Desplechin -- with that in mind. (Should I work in a gratuitous mention of James Franco's Faulkner adaptation, "As I Lay Dying"? Sure, why not? Puzzlingly, that is officially Franco's fifth feature as a director.)

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/cannes_the_10_hottest_movies/feed/ 5 “Post Tenebras Lux”: A perverse, dreamlike masterpiece http://www.salon.com/2013/05/01/post_tenebras_lux_a_perverse_dreamlike_masterpiece/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/01/post_tenebras_lux_a_perverse_dreamlike_masterpiece/#comments Wed, 01 May 2013 15:15:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13286687 A mesmerizing combination of opaque art-house cinema, personal reflection and class-based rural thriller, Mexican director Carlos Reygadas’ “Post Tenebras Lux” casts a strange and powerful spell. While this is certainly a challenging film on many levels, and one rooted in observation of the natural world, it isn’t one of those drifty contemplative Terrence Malick spectacles where nothing much happens. It’s just that many of the events are puzzling and disconnected, and you have to work out for yourself the allusive or subterranean relationship between them. There’s a neon-red animated demon who invades a family’s home at night, a shooting, a hilarious and heartbreaking rural A.A. meeting, a visit to a perverted sex club and a guilt-ridden killer who commits suicide in the most spectacular fashion imaginable. It’s as if we were sometimes in the world of David Lynch, sometimes in the world of Stanley Kubrick and a whole lot of the time in the world of Andrei Tarkovsky, with the complicated social tragedy of Mexico ladled on top.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/01/post_tenebras_lux_a_perverse_dreamlike_masterpiece/feed/ 6 Cannes Film Festival’s 2013 lineup announced http://www.salon.com/2013/04/18/cannes_film_festivals_2013_lineup_announced_ap/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/18/cannes_film_festivals_2013_lineup_announced_ap/#comments Thu, 18 Apr 2013 13:37:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13275046 PARIS (AP) — The Cannes Film Festival's 2013 lineup announced Thursday features work from some of the globe's most dangerous locales for artists, and a sprinkling of works by old favorites including Roman Polanski, the Coen brothers and Steven Soderbergh.

Celebrating world cinema from countries with limited freedom of expression is clearly one of this year's stories, with a lineup with features from Chad, China, Mexico and Iran among the 19 films competing for the Palme d'Or, one of cinema's most coveted prizes.

"The festival is a house that shelters artists in danger," said Cannes President Gilles Jacob, who announced the nominees Thursday.

Harking from Africa, "Grigris" by Chadian filmmaker Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, will feature alongside "The Life of Adele" from French-Tunisian director Abdellatif Kechiche. "Zulu" — a police thriller shot in South Africa and starring Forest Whitaker and Orlando Bloom — will close the festival but is not competing.

The list also includes "A Touch of Sin" by Chinese director Jia Zhangke; "The Past," from Iranian director Asghar Farhadi, featuring Tahar Rahim and rising star Berenice Bejo who garnered attention for "The Artist"; and Mexican narco-film "Heli" by director Amat Escalante, who explores how love and family ties can provide solace in the desperation stemming from drug trafficking.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/18/cannes_film_festivals_2013_lineup_announced_ap/feed/ 1 Steven Spielberg to head Cannes jury this year http://www.salon.com/2013/02/28/steven_spielberg_to_head_cannes_jury_this_year_2/ http://www.salon.com/2013/02/28/steven_spielberg_to_head_cannes_jury_this_year_2/#comments Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:30:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13214665 PARIS (AP) -- France's Cannes Film Festival says it has finally snagged Steven Spielberg to serve as president of the award jury.

Gilles Jacob, the festival's president, recounted how he had been trying to get the award-winning director to head the jury for years - but the American was always working. Finally, this year, Spielberg got in touch.

"When this year I was told `E.T., phone home,' I understood and immediately replied: `At last!'" Jacob said in a statement posted on the festival's website Thursday.

Spielberg, who was nominated but didn't win the directing Oscar for his biopic "Lincoln" this week, takes the reins from Italian Nanni Moretti. The 66th Cannes festival takes place in the glamorous French Mediterranean resort from May 15 to 26.

Spielberg's presence will likely give more of an American flavor this year to the Cannes festival, a mélange of intellectual international cinema and Hollywood glamour. Jury presidents in the festival's seven-decade history have included such figures as Tennessee Williams, Ingrid Bergman, Roman Polanski and Francis Ford Coppola.

Spielberg has had several films show at Cannes, and "E.T." had its world premiere there in 1982. His first film, "Sugarland Express," won best screenplay at Cannes in 1974.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/02/28/steven_spielberg_to_head_cannes_jury_this_year_2/feed/ 0 “Beasts of the Southern Wild”: A spectacular bayou folk tale http://www.salon.com/2012/06/29/beasts_of_the_southern_wild_a_spectacular_bayou_folk_tale/ http://www.salon.com/2012/06/29/beasts_of_the_southern_wild_a_spectacular_bayou_folk_tale/#comments Fri, 29 Jun 2012 14:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12947157 A magic-realist setting in southern Louisiana's bayou country, a child protagonist, a Katrina-scale storm, a posse of enormous prehistoric beasts set loose by the melting polar icecaps, a floating brothel staffed by long-lost moms and a terrorist bombing involving an alligator carcass stuffed with dynamite. Oh, and a cast composed entirely of nonprofessional actors, most of them African-American. Those are the ingredients -- or some of them, anyway -- in the swirling, kaleidoscopic "Beasts of the Southern Wild," the extraordinary and somewhat baffling debut feature from indie writer-director Benh Zeitlin and his New Orleans-based collective Court 13 Pictures.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/06/29/beasts_of_the_southern_wild_a_spectacular_bayou_folk_tale/feed/ 4 American influx at Cannes http://www.salon.com/2012/05/15/an_american_influx_at_cannes_global_glamour_fest/ http://www.salon.com/2012/05/15/an_american_influx_at_cannes_global_glamour_fest/#comments Tue, 15 May 2012 15:30:00 +0000 http://http://www.dev12.salon.com/2012/05/15/an_american_influx_at_cannes_global_glamour_fest/ CANNES, France (AP) — Despite the mood in Europe, don't expect any austerity at the Cannes Film Festival, the annual Cote d'Azur extravaganza where glamour is wrapped in world cinema fervor and gauzy Mediterranean sunshine.

Except for the Oscars, it's the flashiest red carpet in the world, a ruby staircase flanked by tuxedoed photographers — and a world away from financial turmoil.

Yet Cannes, the 65th edition of which starts Wednesday, fetes its directors as much as it does its stars. This year, there are plenty of both: esteemed international filmmakers like Abbas Kiarostami and Michael Haneke to big-name talent like Brad Pitt and Nicole Kidman.

Among the 22 films in competition, there's a particularly large American contingent, starting with the opening night film, Wes Anderson's "Moonrise Kingdom." The movie about adolescent love on the run brings a few new actors (Bruce Willis, Edward Norton) into Anderson's carefully orchestrated world.

Later, there's David Cronenberg's Don DeLillo adaptation "Cosmopolis," starring Robert Pattinson, and Walter Salles' ("The Motorcycle Diaries") anticipated adaptation of Jack Kerouac's beloved "On the Road." That film, produced by Francis Ford Coppola, stars Sam Riley and Garrett Hedlund, but has attracted more attention for its supporting roles, including Pattinson's "Twilight" co-star Kristen Stewart as Dean Moriarty's girlfriend.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/05/15/an_american_influx_at_cannes_global_glamour_fest/feed/ 0 “The Kid With a Bike”: A heart-rending fable of good and evil http://www.salon.com/2012/03/15/the_kid_with_a_bike_a_heart_rending_fable_of_good_and_evil/ http://www.salon.com/2012/03/15/the_kid_with_a_bike_a_heart_rending_fable_of_good_and_evil/#comments Thu, 15 Mar 2012 17:53:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12679111 As anybody who's ever taken a film-history course knows, there's already a pretty famous European movie about a preteen boy and a bicycle. If Vittorio De Sica's 1948 neorealist classic "Bicycle Thieves" (in my day, and perhaps in yours, the English title was singular) is about a kid who has a father but must search for a lost bike, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne's new film is about a kid who finds his bike but must search for his lost father. Whether or not you've ever heard of the Dardennes or their cinematic excursions into the social underbelly of Belgium's third-largest city, "The Kid With a Bike" is an edge-of-your-seat emotional roller-coaster ride, set among ordinary people in a nondescript neighborhood. It's a story about a 30-ish, unmarried hairdresser and an angry, abandoned child, and from those ingredients the Dardennes create something that's part thriller, part love story, part fairy tale and altogether wonderful.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/03/15/the_kid_with_a_bike_a_heart_rending_fable_of_good_and_evil/feed/ 5 “CSI,” if written by Chekhov http://www.salon.com/2012/01/04/csi_if_written_by_chekhov/ http://www.salon.com/2012/01/04/csi_if_written_by_chekhov/#comments Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:30:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=11857511 No, "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" isn't a rediscovered spaghetti western from the 1960s, but Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan is making a rather dry joke with his Sergio Leone-like title. An international film-festival favorite who remains largely unknown outside Turkey and Europe, Ceylan has been described as his country's answer to Ingmar Bergman -- a moral dramatist whose enigmatic, apparently realistic films explore the paradoxes of life in contemporary Turkey. You could call "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" a police procedural, but I don't want to mislead you; don't expect much action or suspense, at least not in the normal movie-world sense of those words.

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