The obviously legendary, hugely influential, always blunt-spoken Gordon Willis has died. The man was and always will be a collossus among cinematographers, right up there with Gregg Toland, Conrad Hall, the Sunrise guys (Karl Struss, Charles Rosher) and all the others profiled in Todd McCarthy‘s Visions of Light. I have to catch an 8:30 am Foxcatcher screening in 40 minutes so I’ll just use a quote from Time Out‘s Steven Garrett, to wit: “More than any other director of photography, Willis defined the cinematic look of the 1970s: sophisticated compositions in which bolts of light and black put the decade’s moral ambiguities into stark relief.”

David Cronenberg‘s Map To The Stars (Weinstein Co., 9.26) is not just a brilliant, black-as-night satire of soul-less, impossibly fucked-up Hollywood players, although it’s certainly that in part. And it’s not just a film that will send Justin Beiber and his representatives into saliva-sputtering fits due to the fact that Beiber is clearly the model for a 13 year-old TV superstar named Benjie Weiss (Evan Bird) — an ice-cold, soul-dead monster who has the makings of a junior-league Hannibal Lecter. What Map to The Stars does altogether — and this is what makes it an historic film within the Cronenberg canon, and which may result in winning the Palme d’Or or some special distinction prize of some kind — is jump off a kind of grand guignol cliff. I went in expecting a stiff swig of vinegar and a smart-ass spoof, but Map, which was written by Bruce Wagner (Force Majeure), is much darker and more visionary and at the same time much more sincere in an unforced, even-handed way.

This is how you do a lethal comic satire, by having the cast perform and behave like they’re not kidding or winking in the slightest, like they really mean it…seriously. Map really cuts to the rancid bone of Hollywood fuckwad culture in a mad-brushstroke way. I think…no, I know it’s Cronenberg’s best since A History of Violence or Spider, and before that Crash, Dead Ringers and The Dead Zone. Julianne Moore owns it pretty much as a nearly over-the-hill actress who’s desperate to stay in the game, but everyone else is on the same page here — John Cusack, Mia Wasikowska, Olivia Williams, Robert Pattinson (yes, he’s on the stick), Sarah Gadon and the afore-mentioned Bird. They all get what’s going on, and it’s all quite perfect and complete.

There are two…well, technically three versions of The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby (Weinstein Co., 9.26) — a Him/Her version (which constitutes two films) and a Them/mashup version. I didn’t see The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Him and Her at last September’s Toronto Film Festival, but it took 191 minutes to tell the same breakup story from the differing perspectives of James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain‘s characters. Word around the campfire is that Him/Her is a more interesting film than the 123-minute Them, which tells the same tale but in a neutral-ish way. In any event I saw Them yesterday in Cannes, and I can tell you three…no, four things:

(1) Them is an intimately rendered, believably performed adult relationship piece that “does it right,” for the most part. It’s about character and trust and need and longing and trauma, and it deserves all the nice things that have been said about it. As such it casts…how to say it?…a certain favor upon director-writer Ned Benson, at least in terms of how it feels as it moves along during the first hour;

(2) I lost patience at the one-hour mark because I suddenly realized nothing was really happening — the story is about a breakup (due to an initially unexplained tragedy) and a possible rapproachment, but it boils down to being about a series of sometimes intriguing, sometimes meandering conversations between family members and friends with little hints of character thrown in from time to time…but nothing really happens in a semi-decisive, plot-propelling sense…nothing that makes you say “oh, that was interesting, what just occured”;

(3) The conversations between Chastain and Viola Davis‘s sardonic, world-weary NYU professor character started to bother me after a while. I started to ask myself, “Why am I supposed to give a shit about what Davis thinks about anything? What is she, Moses down from the mountain? Why doesn’t she just zip it?”;

(4) In the middle of an intimate moment that may signal a new beginning for their relationship, McAvoy tells Chastain that he had it off with another woman (a restaurant co-worker played by Nina Arianda) but not in a way that meant anything. Good God, man…never tell someone you love about any intimate contact (recent or otherwise) with another woman EVER. Respond to questions but never, ever offer that. Any guy who’s dumb enough to do what McAvoy does in this scene doesn’t have my allegiance or rooting interest. When this happened I said to myself, “All right, that’s it…this guy is an emotional idiot…he doesn’t deserve to get back together with Jessica Chastain.”

Tommy Lee Jones‘ The Homesman screened early Sunday morning at the Cannes Film Festival, and it deserves no more than a modest salute. Just because it’s a feminist western with an oddly unusual story that regards the plight of Old West women in a compassionate light…that doesn’t mean it gets a pass. It basically says that life on the prairie could be so brutal and unforgiving that some women went plumb out of their heads; it also says some were so gripped with despair that they offed themselves. That’s a new kind of sadness to bring into a western, and that’s what The Homesman is selling. But that doesn’t mean I have to jump up and click my politically-correct heels and go “whoo-hoo, a great western because it looks at the female side of things!”

Based on a 1988 novel by Glendon Swarthout (The Shootist, Where The Boys Are), it’s a well-made, handsomely-shot drama (set in Nebraska territory) with a few plot turns that are just too what-the-fucky to add up or calculate in a way that feels right. It’s an odd, minor-key effort at best.

During this afternoon’s Expendables 3 press conference at the Carlton, which I was totally down with not attending, Sylvester Stallone was asked “how do know when you are too old to be an action star?” His response: “You wake up in the morning and your ass falls off. Then you know.” He added, “Let me tell you — we are children with arthritis.” Does that mean they have arthritis but are buoyed by the spirit of children? Or that they have super-early-stage arthritis, or the kind that children might have? Harrison “Paycheck” Ford was there — he’s in this video briefly.

Cannes Film Festival tourists always congregate around the entrances to the big hotels on the Croisette on weekends, obviously hoping to catch sight of a celebrity. The Martinez and the J.W. Marriott allow closest access to the unwashed masses. (The Carlton and the Majestic have security guys keeping onlookers from getting any closer than the street.) Is there any activity on the planet that more loudly screams “we have no shame, we are the world champions of lame”? Three or four giggly girls were squealing with delight over something (i.e., probably nothing) just before I took this in front of the Marriott. Regular guests had to be escorted inside by security.

Totally taken by Indiewire‘s Anne Thompson — a more beautiful Cannes snap than any I’ve ever taken here.