Day: May 28, 2022

Disgruntled friendo: “From the Palme d’Or and on down, the Cannes Film Festival awards often don’t make any sense, and this year are only compounding what is now the twee irrelevance of Cannes itself.”

Ruben Ostlund‘s Triangle of Sadness takes the Palme d’Or! And a lot of people are scratching their heads. Sadness is a very funny, impudent and whipsmart satire during the first half, but it loses something when the vomiting scene kicks in aboard the Christina O. The second half isn’t as good as the first, and no one has disputed this. So why did it win the top prize?

I’m a serious fan of the film and Ostlund in general, but this seems like a political call. The film bluntly satirizes the super-wealthy and the general spread of self-obsession, selfishness and social media. Congrats to Ostlund and his cast, but this is kinda nuts, man.

Friendo: “I didn’t love Triangle of Sadness — like you I found the second half slow and dawdling and didactic, and obviously woker-than-woke in the desert-island section — and it’s just so disappointing that they would give the Palme to Ostland AGAIN, for a film that’s not really good enough. But all you have to do is scroll through the entire history of Cannes winners to remind yourself that one-half to three-fifths of them are utterly nuts. Totally undeserving.”

Grand Prize: A tie between Lukas Dhont‘s Close (fully deserved) and Claire Denis‘ The Stars at Noon….another crazy call. The Denis isn’t even close to Dhont’s realm of accomplishment, and so this feels like feminist positivism — Denis’ film has seemingly won for the same reason that Power of the Dog‘s Jane Campion won the Best Director Oscar — an aging, distinguished feminist helmer is paid tribute for her long brave career.

Trust me, The Stars at Noon is okay but delivers nowhere near the emotional combustion of Close.

Best Director: Park Chan-wook for Decision to Leave. I give up. We all understood that Decision wasn’t any kind of masterful effort except technically, but the Park Chan-wook cabal is curiously adamant about his being honored because…well, mainly because Decision has excellent chops. It’s certainly not good enough to win a big award, but here we are regardless.

Special 75th Anniversary Prize: Jean-Pierre et Luc Dardenne‘s Tori et Lokita…at least it didn’t win the Palme.

Jury Prize: The Eight Mountains and Jerzy Skolimowsky’s EO…a tie.

Best Actor: Song Kang Ho (the Parasite guy with the slightly oafish expression) for Broker.

Best Screenplay: Tarik Saleh, Boy From Heaven.

Best Actress: Zar Amir Embrahimi, Holy Spider.

Camera d’Or: Riley Keough‘s War Pony, a film that I liked and respected for the most part.

Random sloppy thoughts: Embrahimi’s crusading female journalist in Holy Spider wins for Best Actress? Why? Her peformance is apparently being celebrated because of the feminist symbolism aspect — because her fictitious journalist character was persistent and committed and basically busted an infamous woman-loathing serial killer singlehandedly. Again — Embrahimi is okay but why all the excitement?

I wasn’t dead bored by Broker, but it was certainly an in-and-outer. If you ask me it’s bullshit to give the Best Actor trophy to the Parasite chauffeur guy — Song Kang Ho. Really mystifying. Song just repeated his awkward middle-aged-guy performance from Parasite, the same character wearing the same timid, not-fully-comprehending expression…this time he’s playing another kind of hustler or scammer…more or less the same deal.

I didn’t see Le Otto Montagne but Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO (basically an Au Hazard Balthazar remake) felt sloppy and catch-as-catch-can — meandering, spotty, didn’t kick into gear, overly impressionistic and kind of a mess. No buzz, no excitement and no applause after the press screening ended and yet they’ve split the Jury Prize and given both of these films an award for same? This is CRAZY!

The Angeli Rose Gomez story is a couple of days old but I was buried in Cannes screenings, etc. Someone needs to make a documentary about this woman and what she did last Tuesday in Uvalde, or maybe even a feature.

If you can’t get past the Wall Street Journal paywall here’s a N.Y.Post version of same.

Compare what Angeli did to the chickenshit Uvalde cops who waited and stood around and did nothing while kids were getting plugged.

The Wall Street Journal‘s Douglas Belkin, Rob Copeland and Elizabeth Findell broke Angeli’s story.

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World of Reel‘s Jordan Ruimy has been told that the Palme d’Or will either go to Lukas Dhont‘s Close (the right choice) or to the sad (i.e., tragic) but unexceptional Tori et Lokita, the latest moderately decent film from Jean Paul and Luc Dardennes, the Belgian brothers who make the same kind of matter-of-fact, low-key, point-and-watch film year after year after year.

Tori and Lokita is fine but very familiar if you know the Dardenne and how their films tend to play. It’s about a pair of African immigrants (not related but pretending to be) suffering cruel or indifferent treatment, mostly at the hands of Belgian drug dealers. You can’t help feeling sorry for these kids, but desperate immigrants have been getting kicked around and exploited for centuries, haven’t they? Life can be heartless for have-nots.

Audience compassion for victims is one thing; recognition of filmmaking excellence is another. The twains don’t necessarily overlap.

The last time I was on the Cannes-to-Paris train was four or five years ago. No SNCF wifi then — you were on your own with your phone signal. Now there’s on-board wifi and with a semi-decent strength. Left Cannes this morning at 11:24 am — arriving at Gare de Lyon around 5 pm (or 8 am Los Angeles time). The high-speed rail vibe is a nice gentle groove. It settles you. We’re just north of Lyon now. The HE pad is at 74 rue Duhesme, in the 18th. I should be opening the door by 6 pm or thereabouts. I’m looking forward to a nice, long, relaxing walk around town.

…had the cast-iron balls to go with a Bridges at Toko-Ri ending, rather than the triumphant one they chose. I’m talking about Tom Cruise‘s titular character and Miles Teller‘s “Rooster” Bradshaw suffering the same fate that William Holden and Mickey Rooney did 68 years ago. I’m talking about Cruise and Teller being surrounded by enemy troops after crash landing and putting up a good Wild Bunch-level fight before being outflanked and shot to death.

Dying together would have added poignance to the brotherly bond that Maverick had with Rooster’s dad, “Goose”, back in the ’80s, not to mention ending the contentious vibe that exists between Rooster and Maverick from the beginning.

A death ending would also have said “oh and by the way? War isn’t a fucking video game….it’s real, and sometimes the mission doesn’t go perfectly and sometimes good pilots buy the farm.”

A Cruise-and-Teller Toko Ri ending would probably translate into a slightly diminished box-office, agreed, but maybe not. A major character dying at the end of Titanic didn’t hurt the returns any. Not to mention Daniel Craig getting killed at the close of the highly successful No Time To Die.

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