I’m naturally presuming that this “leaked” 2013 Cannes competition roster is bogus until I hear otherwise from at least two people in a position to know. But if it’s genuine — I say “if” — everyone will be over the moon about seeing Alexander Payne‘s black-and-white Nebraska, which you have to automatically assume will be a Best Picture contender because…you know, the Payne brand. This is just what Cannes needed. But let’s not jump the gun. The official announcement is 12 or 13 hours away.
None of the 2013 Cannes Film Festival prediction pieces have even toyed with the possibility of James Toback and Alec Baldwin‘s Seduced and Abandoned, a documentary about the film business and financing in particular, being one of the attractions. Shot during last year’s festival and featuring encounters with numerous industry hotshots, the now-completed film sounds to me like a semi-likely inclusion. Perhaps in some kind out-of-competition slot or under Director’s Fortnight or Un Certain Regard.
“The movie business is the worst girlfriend in the world,” Baldwin said in Simon Dang‘s 5.31.12 Indiewire article about the film. “You go back again and again and again. You go back with another chance to do something that you want to do in moviemaking or moviegoing. You are seduced and abandoned over and over again.”
I’ve been hearing this and that person say “I obviously don’t know anything but this is starting to feel like a bit of a weak festival.” The only way to shake that feeling would be to bring in a major fall awards contender, and that would be Alexander Payne‘s Nebraska…right? Remember that No Country For Old Men vibe when Joel and Ethan Coen‘s film debuted at Cannes six years ago? That “whoa, stand back” feeling? That’s what we need to lift things up this year.
I’ve already indicated a general lack of enthusiasm for Nicholas Winding Refn and Ryan Gosling‘s Only God Forgives, which is looking like a likely inclusion. I’ve written so much about Joel and Ethan’s Inside Llewyn Davis (including a March 2012 script review) that it almost feels like I’ve seen it.
Steven Soderbergh‘s Behind the Candelabra is said to be likely. Ditto Sofia Coppola‘s The Bling Ring and Asghar Farhadi‘s The Past.
I wouldn’t mind catching JC Chandor‘s All is Lost, the Robert Redford survivalist drama. Oliver Hirschbiegel‘s Diana would be welcome. Ditto Jonathan Glazer‘s Under the Skin, Guillaume Canet‘s Blood Ties and Jim Jarmusch‘s Only Lovers Left Alive.
I was really hoping for Alfonso Cuaron‘s 3D Gravity but that won’t be completed until sometime this summer, I’m told by a top-dog source. Yes, even though it test-screened early last November at the Sherman Oaks Arclight.
I would be down with Ryan Coogler‘s Fruitvale (which I still haven’t seen), Spike Jonze‘s Her, James Gray‘s Lowlife, Luc Besson‘s Malavita and/or Roman Polanski‘s Venus in Fur.
My “Dream Cannes” picks include Paul Greengrass‘s Captain Phillips (wny not?), Steve McQueen‘s 12 Years A Slave, Jason Reitman‘s Labor Day (which was test screened two or three months ago), and Spike Lee‘s Oldboy.
Nobody in the U.S. press pack will express great enthusiasm much about Baz Luhrman‘s The Great Gatsby as it will have opened commercially in th U.S. five days earlier. The period drama will open the festival.
The 2013 Cannes film festival runs from 5.15 through 5.26.
I’ve run variations of this most eagerly waited films of 2013 list a couple of times since December. The count is now at 58, although I’ve deleted some titles and added four or five. But things evolve and clarify as time moves along so it can’t hurt to go over it once more. As usual, please point out any mistakes or anything I’ve missed.
I understand that it’s my lot in life to mostly suffer through the winter and spring, nibbing whatever morsels I can find, and then succumb to numbing fatigue and occasional nausea during the May-July blockbuster season and then, finally — finally! — get a little satisfaction come early September and some serious nutritional soul food in late October, November and December.
It’ll never happen, but I wish the quality stuff could be spread out a bit more. A very small portion of these films will open in the spring and summer and two or three might not come out until 2014 (especially those directed by Terrence Wackadoodle), but if the vast majority are in fact going to open in 2013, the accepted industry practice of only releasing the goodies only between Labor Day and Christmas means that something close to 45 or 50 will have to open within a four-month window, or roughly 12 per month or three per week.
That’s a lot to absorb and process, and that’s not even counting the crap popcorn stuff. So we’ll all be looking at a very full fall-holiday season, and the game will begin six and half months from now. Get some rest.
(1) John Wells‘ August: Osage County.
(2) Alexander Payne‘s Nebraska.
(3) Alfonso Cuaron‘s Gravity;
(4) George Clooney‘s Monuments Men (a.k.a., cousin of The Train).
(5) Paul Greengrass‘s Captain Phillips.
(6) Martin Scorsese‘s Wolf of Wall Street.
(7) Jason Reitman‘s Labor Day.
(8) Joel and Ethan Coen‘s Inside Llewyn Davis.
(9) Bennett Miller‘s Foxcatcher.
(10) John Lee Hancock‘s Saving Mr. Banks.
(11) Ridley Scott‘s The Counselor.
(12) Spike Lee‘s Oldboy.
(13) Luc Besson‘sMalavita.
(14) Steve McQueen‘s 12 Years A Slave.
(15) Baz Luhrman‘s The Great Gatsby (which might have issues).
(16) Spike Jonze‘s Her.
(17) Anton Corbijn‘s A Most Wanted Man, based on a John le Carre novel and costarring Willem Dafoe, Rachel McAdams, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Robin Wright.
(18 & 19): Terrence Malick‘s two ventures — the Austin-based film formerly known as Lawless (who knows what it’s called now?) plus the relationship vehicle Knight of Cups with Christian Bale and Natalie Portman. It could be that neither will be released until 2014 or 2015. You know Malick. (2)
(20) Wes Anderson‘s The Grand Budapest Hotel. Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton and Jeff Goldblum, Willem Dafoe, F. Murray Abraham, Jude Law, Adrien Brody, Edward Norton, Harvey Keitel, Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Mathieu Amalric, Owen Wilson.
(21) James Gray‘s Nightingale, a New York-based period drama w/ Jeremy Renner, Marion Cotillard and Joaquin Phoenix.
(22) Guillame Canet‘s Blood Ties, a 1970s cops-and-criminals drama w/ Marion Cotillard, Clive Owen, Billy Crudup, Mila Kunis, Zoe Saldana, James Caan, Noah Emmerich.
(23) David O. Russell‘s Abscam movie (once known as American Bullshit — starts shooting in March so might not be ready this year…who knows?
(24) Noah Baumbach‘s Frances Ha (seen & praised at Telluride 2012 — definitely worth its weight).
(25) Richard Linklater‘s Before Midnight (a major Sundance 2013 highlight and an all-but-guaranteed Oscar contender for Best Original Screenplay).
(26) Stephen Frears‘ Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fight.
(27) Sofia Coppola‘s The Bling Ring.
(28) Lars von Trier‘s Nymphomaniac.
(29) Wong Kar Wai‘s The Grandmaster — I don’t want to know from this film as all Asian combat/martial-arts films will be instantly ignored in this corner from now until the day I die. I will not go there under penalty of death, fines and imprisonment.
(30) Pedro Almodovar‘s I’m So Excited (all things Pedro!),
(31) Joe Swanberg‘s Drinking Buddies (Anna Kendrick, Olivia Wilde, Jake Johnson).
(32) Jean-Pierre Jeunet‘s The Young and Prodigious Spivet (Judy Davis, Helena Bonham Carter, etc.).
(33) Peter Landesman‘s Parkland.
(34) Diablo Cody‘s untitled film (which was called Lamb of God when I read the script last year).
(35) Brian Helgeland‘s 42 (Jackie Robinson biopic w/ Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford).
(36) Oliver Hirschbiegel‘s Diana (Princess of Wales biopic/love affair with Naomi Watts).
(37) Asghar Farhadi‘s The Past.
(38) John Michael McDonagh‘s Calvary.
(39) Paolo Sorrentino‘s La Grande Bellezza.
(40) Hossein Amini‘s The Two Faces of January.
(41) Francois Ozon‘s Jeune at Jolie (an apparent riff on Luis Bunuel‘s Belle du Jour).
(42) Terry Gilliam‘s The Zero Theorem.
(43) Woody Allen‘s Blue Jasmine.
(44) Roman Polanski‘s Venus in Fur.
(45) Danny Boyle’s‘s Trance, a crime thriller w/ James McAvoy, Vincent Cassel, Rosario Dawson. (Fox Searchlight, April).
(46) John Crowley‘s Closed Circuit.
(47) Susanne Bier‘s Serena — a period reteaming of Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper.
(48) Errol Morris‘s The Unknown Known: The Life and Times of Donald Rumsfeld.
(49) Ryan Coogler‘s Fruitvale — the big hit of Sundance 2013, acquired by the Weinstein Co.
One could also include Ben Stiller‘s The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Nicholas Winding Refn‘s Only God Forgives, Ron Howard‘s Rush, David Cronenberg‘s Maps to the Stars. Neill Blomkamp‘s Elysium, Joseph Kosinski‘s Oblivion, Robert Schwentke‘s R.I.P.D., Sam Raimi‘s Oz: The Great and Powerful and Guillermo del Toro‘s Pacific Rim (9).
Our LAX-to-JFK Virgin flight just passed over Republican City, Nebraska. Is there a town in Oregon or Northern California called “Liberal Corners” or “Leftyville”?
The guy in front of me has a little extra leg room because he’s sitting right behind the plastic, blue-tinted panel that divides first class from coach, so he’s doing pretty well. But with that extra comfort he just had to go for a little more and lean his seat back, right into my 18 inches of private space and my 13″ Macbook Pro. Uhm…Fred? I’m trying to work here and it’s pretty tight as it is without you being a thoughtless dick about it. Okay, thanks…much appreciated. He doesn’t know how lucky he is. If he hadn’t complied I would done the old accidental-spillage-of-Coke-on-his-head routine.
The unfolding of the predicament of George Clooney‘s Matt King “is surprising, moving and frequently very funny,” says N.Y. Times critic A.O. Scott in his review of The Descendants. “Director Alexander Payne — immeasurably aided by a dazzlingly gifted, doggedly disciplined cast — nimbly sidesteps the sentimental traps that lurk within the film’s premise. He somehow achieves the emotional impact of good melodrama and the hectic absurdity of classic farce without ever seeming to exaggerate.
“There are times when you laugh or gasp in disbelief at what has just happened — an old man punches a teenager in the face; a young girl utters an outrageous obscenity; Mr. Clooney slips on a pair of boat shoes and runs, like an angry, flightless bird, to a neighbor’s house — and yet every moment of the movie feels utterly and unaffectedly true.
“A lively and complicated mesh of plots and subplots takes shape” within The Descendants, “but the most striking and satisfying aspects are its unhurried pace and loose, wandering structure.
“In most movies the characters are locked into the machinery of narrative like theme park customers strapped into a roller coaster. Their ups and downs are as predetermined as their shrieks of terror and sighs of relief, and the audience goes along for the ride. But the people in this movie seem to move freely within it, making choices and mistakes and aware, at every turn, that things could be different.
“Each person who shows up on screen, even for a minute or two with nothing especially important to accomplish, has an odd and memorable individuality. The Descendants seems to unfold within a vast landscape of possible stories. [And] Mr. Payne, with a light touch and a keen sense of place — this Hawaii is as real and peculiar as the Nebraska of About Schmidt or the California wine country of Sideways — has made a movie that, for all its modesty, is as big as life. Its heart is occupied by grief, pain and the haunting silence of [Matt’s comatose wife] Elizabeth, whose version of events is the only one we never hear. And yet it is also full of warmth, humor and the kind of grace that can result from our clumsy attempts to make things better.
“To call The Descendants perfect would be a kind of insult, a betrayal of its commitment to, and celebration of, human imperfection. Its flaws are impossible to distinguish from its pleasures. For example: after what feels as if it should be the final scene, a poignant, quiet tableau of emotional resolution and apt visual beauty, Mr. Payne adds another, a prosaic coda to a flight of poetry.
“Without saying too much or spoiling the mood, I will say that I was grateful for this extra minute, a small gift at the end of a film that understands, in every way, how hard it can be to say goodbye.”
One of my sons said this newly purchased jacket ($45 in a Melrose consignment store) makes me look like a gangbanger. It’s actually a racing-label jacket commemorating Doug Herbert’s 2004 World Tour. If your natural youthful effervescence ain’t what it used to be, it’s okay to supplement with a splash of color here and there.
From a mini-bio: “Dougzilla Herbert is a four-time International Hot Rod Association Top Fuel champion (1992, 1994-96). He won 20 IHRA races, including five of seven events in 1992. Herbert was the first IHRA competitor to run a four-second elapsed time in 1992 at Scribner, Nebraska. He also was the first in IHRA to exceed 300 mph, 1995 at Bristol, Tennessee. In 2004, Herbert embarked on the Dougzilla World Tour and ran 11 slightly different paint schemes in each of the cities he raced.”
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