I’ve been feeling completely adjusted to European time, so I was surprised a few minutes ago to find myself suddenly waking from a nap while sitting on the outdoor balcony of the Grand Palais. Okay, I was slumping but more or less in an upright position in a chair with my Macbook Pro and camera in my lap, and my open black tote bag at my feet. (I’m not presuming that any journalist would take advantage but you never know.) It’s a very strange feeling to wake up from a dream in the sunlight, sitting, dressed, surrounded by others…”what?”

I hate frivolity. I despise escapist “fun.” I loathe corporate-supplied nothingness. And I abhor CG movies in which anything can and does happen and no rules apply and people fly through the air like winged squirrels and everything is meaningless eye syrup. I agree somewhat that Rob Marshall‘s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which I caught this morning, is a little more like the first one and therefore more tolerable, etc. But I mostly hated the first one, you see.

Johnny Depp, Penelope Cruz

So how did I get through the damn thing (i.e., all two hours and 17 minutes ‘ worth)? Through selective concentration on aspects I found appealing.

(1) The incessantly rich, razzle-dazzle composition of the photography. Everything you see in each and every shot has been lit within an inch of its life, finessed to a fare-thee-well, sprayed and misted and gone over with a fine tooth comb. No visual element has been left to chance or under-utilized. The problem, of course, is that it’s all in the service of cancerous swill.

(2) I realized early on that in the realm of fountain-of-youth action-adventures, this inch-deep hodgepodge makes Steven Spielberg‘s Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade look like a masterwork, an art film, a movie with a near-soul, an Alexander Korda 1940s classic.

(3) The verdant and altogether splendorful Hawaiian locations (Kaua’i, Oahu).

(4) Some of the 3D shots are appealing, but mostly the 3D element is just okay. None of it staggers. Honestly? I could’ve rolled with a flat version.

(5) The only 100% sincere performance is given by Sam Claflin, playing a missionary (Sam Claflin). The mermaid he falls in love with (played by Astrid Berges-Frisbey) is pseudo-topless in much of the film, which is to say impressionistically. She’s carefully covered in old-style ’50s fashion, like Maureen O’Hara‘s big scene in Lady Godiva. Why would a Disney film include a topless mermaid in the first place? What’s the point?

(6) I spent a lot of time thinking about all the hundreds of millions that have been pointlessly spent making these films and even more pointlessly earned in theatres worldwide, and about what Johnny Depp and Jerry Bruckheimer made (and will earn back-end) on this one, and what they paid Penelope Cruz and how much Geoffrey Rush pulls down, etc. And what kind of food was served on the set and where everyone stayed when they shot in Hawaii, England and Puerto Rico. What kind of per diems did they receive?

(7) Ian McShane‘s performance as Edward “Blackbeard” teach is an eye-level, steady-as-she-goes, only slightly japey turn. I relaxed somewhat when he was on-screen. McShane seems to actually sink into the role to some degree; he’s goofing along with everyone else, of course, but in a somewhat restrained, steely-McShane sort of way.

(8) The CG evocations of old London are nicely done. I just wish the camera could’ve held still for four or five seconds so I could’ve absorbed a bit more detail.

(9) The absense of Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley isn’t a problem. At all.

Do I have the character and resolve to “just say no” to this morning’s 8:30 am screening of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides? Which a critic friend told me is “awful”? I’d like to think I have the character to shine it, but I guess I don’t. But journalists were talking about sleeping in on Saturday morning last Tuesday night. The damn thing runs 2 hours and 17 minutes. Bottom line: if I can get my hate on, it’ll probably make for a half-decent piece.

The Paul Bowles version of what I was trying to describe would be called “four o’ clock in the morning Croisette courage.”

One of two clips captured of Weinstein Co.’s Harvey Weinstein at this evening’s Martinez Hotel product reel & mike-time presentation. Black-and-white silent footage from the highly-anticipated The Artist was shown. Sarah Jessica Parker introduced a five-minute reel for I Don’t Know How She Does It. The Wu Xia gang showed up and took a bow. But there was no Iron Lady footage!

After it ended I retired to the Martinez Hotel bar/lounge to upload videos and photos. This is definitely one of the Hot Babe meccas. They stride through the lobby in groups of twos, threes and fours. And they all sit in the bar for two rounds, spending 13 or 14 or 15 euros per drink. And then they leave. The guys in this place are all older, Euro-coozy types — longish hair, black loafers or pumps, slick duds and smoothie attitudes. Some guys, okay, are on the youngish twentysomething side, but not that many.

The only differences between Dave Germain’s white pass and my pink-with-a-yellow-dot pass are (a) the whites get to sit in a speciaily reserved row (or two or three) at the rear of the Lumiere and/or Debussy, and (b) something else that I can’t remember. Free tickets to black-tie screenings?

I don’t know the Wu Xia guys that well but Weinstein Co.’s Pantea Ghaderi helped out: (l. to r.) Takeshi Kaneshiro, director Peter Chan, Donnie Yen, Wei Tang, Kara Hui.

Let’s have a little understanding and…well, I was going to say “compassion” for Osama bin Laden‘s penchant for porn. Even mass murderers have libidinal longings, etc. Day in and day out at that grungy Pakistan compound…you can imagine the frustration. Sexual hunger has always been a great leveller, and now — hallelujah! — the Great Dead Fiend has been revealed on a certain level as just another middle-aged bearded guy with a bone-on.

But which porn stars did he like exactly? Or what types? Western blondes, down-home Southern girsl in cutoffs, veiled Muslim wives? To think that Osama bin Laden and LexG had something in common…the mind reels.

The legend is that the prolonged stress of shooting John Huston‘s The Misfits (’61), and particularly the delays caused by the relentlessly insecure and drug-dependent Marilyn Monroe, basically killed Clark Gable. The 60-year old Gable suffered a heart attack two days after filming ended and died ten days later. But he also smoked like a crazy man and reportedly drank a lot.

The Misfits was also the last completed film for Monroe. She was dead of a barbituate overdose 18 months after it opened in February ’61. The Wiki page says just about everyone involved disliked The Misfits — Monroe and costar Montgomery Clift, certainly. And it didn’t make very much money. No wonder — it’s more than a bit of a downer. The Bluray will soon street.

Nanni Moretti‘s Habemus Papam, which screened this morning at 8:30 am, is about a newly-chosen Pope (Michel Piccoli) feeling overwhelmed and depressed and unable to pick up the sceptre. The tone is basically one of dry, highly restrained farce. Moretti told a journalist earlier this year that it “contains a painful core but [is] wrapped in a light tone.” That about says it. It’s simultaneously gentle and whimsical and melancholy, and a bit silly.

I suppose Habemus Papam will be seen in some Roman Catholic circles as a impudent tweaking of the lore of Vatican City, etc. But it didn’t strike me as nearly caustic or judgmental enough.

Piccoli is playing an old man who’s not only depressed but a little bit stupid, trembling and confused and enduring much stress and confusion in simply trying to explain what and who he is, and why he feels so exhausted, etc. I don’t care if some depressives act like this — it’s boring and frustrating to watch.

And yet the 85 year-old Piccoli gives a touching performance. I’ll give him and Moretti and the film that. But otherwise I was underwhelmed. I’ve since gotten the sense that I wasn’t alone.

Variety‘s Dave McNary is reporting that the Weinstein Co. has acquired U.S. distribution rights to The Iron Lady, the Margaret Thatcher biopic directed by Phyllida Lloyd and starring Meryl Streep. The intention is to release it later this year and — count on it — mount a front-and-center Best Actress campaign for Streep.

The main Lady issue concerns the one-two combo of director Lloyd, whose handling of Mamma Mia! makes her seem an unlikely provider of a presumably solemn-minded drama about Thatcher’s tough times at 10 Downing Street, and Iron

Lady rewriter Abi Morgan, whose description of herself as an example of “Thatcher youth” suggests that she and Lloyd may be looking to soften or at least emotionalize their portrait of Thatcher.

The question is whether their film will ultimately be seen as Academy-quality, which of course would push Streep into front-runner status, or perhaps as a bit too Thatcher-friendly by the British press, which could result in a backlash.

If the film’s rep becomes that of a good-enough drama that is primarily a forum for a tour de force Streep performance, then who knows? It may be that the ultimate function of The Iron Lady will be to warm up Academy voters so that Streep’s sure-to-be-powerhouse performance as Violet Weston in John Wells‘ August: Osage County, which the Weinstein Co,. is planning to release in 2012, becomes an unstoppable Oscar force.

Short version: Streep wins for The Iron Lady in February 2012 and August: Osage County in February 2013, or two years in a row. Or she wins for Lady but not for Osage because of the “Meryl again?” factor. Or not for Lady because the movie might not be good enough but the acclaim for her Thatcher performance results in a lock-down, don’t-even-think-about-not-giving-her-the-Oscar win for Osage. I’m figuring it’s gotta be one of these three.

Keith Allen‘s Unlawful Killing, an examination of the death of the former Princess Diana in Paris on 8.31.97, showed to Cannes press (myself included) at the Olympia plex at noon today.

Style-wise it’s a slick, tabloid-level doc — one of those the hit-and-run, flash-and-dash TV reports that use reenactments (as this one does). And content-wise it’s all sizzle and no steak. Allen’s film doesn’t begin to prove a cover-up by the royal-favoring British establishment over the death of Princess Diana. It asks interesting questions here and there and raises suspicions, but this sort of thing does not a case make.

It’s basically dealing in crumbs and cold scents and tantalizing dingle-dangles. It’s my idea of a waste of time.

Crucially, it offers no concrete alternate scenario that might at least intrigue or amuse. It doesn’t step up to the plate with a counter-myth (a term used by Oliver Stone when JFK was first released) about how and why Diana and Dodi Fayed, her no-account playboy boyfriend, died at the hand of British forces who wanted them dead. And it seems to deliberately ignore or misstate what I understand to be verified facts. It’s mainly interested in saying over and over again, “This and that sure sounds fishy.”

Unlawful Killing has reportedly been financially backed by Dodi’s father, Mohamed Al-Fayed. The film repeats the basic Al-Fayed line, as reported in the Wiki page, that the car crash which took Diana’s life “was a result of a conspiracy orchestrated by MI6 on the instructions of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.”

Al-Fayed’s conspiracy claims “were dismissed by a French judicial investigation and by Operation Paget, a Metropolitan police inquiry that concluded in 2006.”

I could bore into it and discuss numerous aspects of the case, but it’s really not worth going into. Allen’s doc isn’t good enough to warrant all that energy.

Oh, and the Lady Diana death photo that the film shows, and which received some press a few days ago? It appeared in an Italian magazine a few years ago. It’s been sitting on my desktop hard drive since ’06 or thereabouts. No biggie.

Leave it to George Lucas — as deaf, dumb and blind as ever — to revive memories of the despised The Phantom Menace and particularly Jake Lloyd — giver of arguably the most reprehensible child performance in the history of movies — with the box-set cover of the forthcoming complete Star Wars saga on Bluray. If I were Lucas I would do everything I could to squelch memories of this film, and in fact all the prequels. I would ballyhoo Parts IV through VI and hope that the public might be willing to forgive, etc.

The just-out Some Like It Hot Bluray “is an absolute pleasure to watch in high definition,” declares a nameless Blu-ray.com writer. “There’s little brightness flickering, no major print damage, and — here’s the biggest relief — no hints of excess noise reduction or edge enhancement. The film’s grain structure is intact, and the image looks entirely natural, free from any after-the-fact boosting or tweaking. Cloth and skin textures look more finely resolved and there’s a greater degree of detail all around.”