Defamer
cannes film festival
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Cannes Film festival
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The totally accidental mystery of the angry critic who stormed out of a crowded Cannes screening of Two Lovers rather than "wait an hour for fucking [director] James Gray" was put to rest this afternoon at Entertainment Weekly, where critic Lisa Schwarzbaum copped to the outburst we once guessed came from Manohla Dargis. "And since I'm giving PopWatch readers a spectacular scoop, let me tell you what happened next," Schwarzbaum wrote. "I extricated myself from the angry mob at 9:30 p.m., took myself out to dinner, had a nice bowl of pasta and a glass of wine, and returned an hour later to a crowd, albeit smaller, still waiting for f—-—g James Gray. ... As they say in beer ads, read blog items responsibly!" The catch? Schwarzbaum outed herself on a blog! We're not falling for that one; we'll believe it when it's in the magazine. [EW]
As if Page Six's blind items weren't problematic enough, NY Post film critic Lou Lumenick last week offered a fun one from Cannes that found our refined hunch-dar betraying us. "Members of the press were lining up at the entrance to the announced venue well more than a hour before [Two Lovers] began," he wrote. " 'I'm not going to wait an hour for f—-ing James Gray,' one major U.S. film critic declared, before storming off, of the film's American director, who is much more popular among critics in Europe than he is in his native country." There's a pretty short list of "major U.S. film critics" these days anyway, but the anecdote provoked visions of the NY Times' Manohla Dargis protesting to the Cannes overlords. However, as Dargis assured us this morning, "storming" is not her style; she indeed waited an hour just like everyone else for fucking James Gray. So it's back to the blind-item drawing board for us, alas. Was Rex Reed at Cannes? [Defamer]
cannes film festival
power plays
Jealous Harvey Weinstein Stakes His Own Claim to 'Valkyrie' Debacle
Amid all of Tuesday's post-holiday hustle and bustle, we regrettably overlooked perhaps the most profound news item of the day: Harvey Weinstein indirectly hopped in the Valkyrie fray at Cannes by picking up US theatrical/DVD rights to Operation Valkyrie, a 2004 German retelling of the failed plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. It's the same film Tom Cruise and Bryan Singer made (or are making, with worse accents) only to see it bumped twice to a Feb. 2009 release-date Siberia by Cruise/UA's partners at MGM — oddly the same folks with whom The Weinstein Company shares its own distribution deal. Small world, eh? It gets even weirder — kind of. More »
dreams
Blame France for the New Screenwriting Diddy
He can rap! He can act! He can produce (music AND plays)! He’s the dapperest of gentlemen ever to be accused of assault, bribery, shootings, sweatshop labor, a fatal stampede and making coats out of dogs! And now Diddy has a new occupation: screenwriter. According to the always reliable entertainment news service WENN, Diddy was “so inspired” by this year’s Cannes Film Festival that he decided to venture into feature writing. But wasn’t the festival like two days ago, you ask? Yes, yes it was. Apparently, Mr. Puffycombs wastes no time making his brand new dreams come true. More »
cannes film festival
Cannes Hell Wrap-Up: What Does 'Variety' Have Against 'Che,' Anyway?
The Cannes Film Festival wound down Sunday pretty much where we left it Friday: Lindsay Lohan still digs girls, distributors mostly kept their checkbooks closed with one or two exceptions, and Sean Penn and his competition jury putatively fulfilled their social mandate by awarding the French schoolroom drama Entre les Murs (The Class) this year's Palme d'Or. The remaining winners reflect both a who's who of perennial Cannes rock stars (screenplay winners Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, directing winner Nuri Bilge Ceylan) and sure-fire up-and-comers (Best First Film winner Steve McQueen).
The most controversial American film of the fest, meanwhile — Steven Soderbergh's as-yet-unsold epic Che — won only a best actor prize for Benicio Del Toro after critics predicted (and/or prayed for) much more. Critics everywhere but Variety, that is, which has us wondering: What did Che ever do to these guys anyway?
More »
junk science
Sharon Stone's Bold 'Karma Tectonics' Theory Infuriates Chinese Quake Victims
When Sharon Stone wasn't joking about Sean Combs's crack budget last week at the Cannes Film Festival's high-powered amFar benefit, she took a few minutes on the red carpet to play amateur seismologist for the international press. That went about as well as you'd expect when, only seconds into discussing the humanitarian crisis facing China after the May 12 earthquake that killed more than 67,000 people, Stone attributed the tragedy to... karma? More »
the end of ideas
Charitable 'Bad Lieutenant' Director Wishes Hellish, Explosive Death on Werner Herzog and Nicolas Cage
The ongoing, skull-melting hallucination yielding visions of Werner Herzog micromanaging Nicolas Cage's masturbation technique abated slightly today when, at a Cannes press conference for his new film Chelsea on the Rocks, director Abel Ferrara raised his first public objection to duo's planned remake of his 1992 effort Bad Lieutenant: More »
cannes film festival
Today in Cannes Hell: Market Lags for Everything But Photos of Lindsay Lohan Making Out With Samantha Ronson
As we established previously, little is happening movie- or industry-wise at the Cannes Film Festival; even Croisette-weary NY Times critic A.O. Scott is officially on the record now with his ambivalence about this year's crop. As such, we lead today's fest news round-up not with the general befuddlement over Synecdoche, New York or continued rapture around Che, but with the only story worth our consideration as the event slumps, thuds and dies until a phoenix-like restoration in 2009: OMG Is Lindsay, like, totally kissing Samantha Ronson? More
cannes film festival
Americans Need Balls, Indies Need Buyers as Chilly Cannes Winds Down
Where are the big spenders this year at Cannes? After a 2007 buying spree that topped out with Universal snagging We Own the Night for a whopping $11.5 million, only one distributor has made any considerable investment in the current crop of selections — IFC Films, which made news Wednesday by acquiring the acclaimed Irish drama Hunger, its seventh buy in as many days. And even its other deals — an international mash-up including A Christmas Tale (France), Chaser (S. Korea) and the American indie The Pleasure of Being Robbed — are slated for minimal theatrical play as they funnel into IFC's day-and-date on-demand circuit. More »
cannes film festival
Today in Cannes Hell: The Great 'Che' Debate Begins
One tiny, loaded word pretty much summed up Wednesday at Cannes: Che. Steven Soderbergh's two-part, four-hour-plus biopic premiered last night to a sprawling range of reactions, most of which seem to embrace the challenging film (and particularly Benicio Del Toro's performance as the title revolutionary) even while doubting the film would ever again screen again in its current version. Soderbergh and star Benicio Del Toro were only slightly defensive when it came time to face the press: More »
rambling man
Nick Nolte Tells All to Nick Nolte in Stirring New Documentary
While the Cannes cognoscenti revel in the unblinking confessions of Mike Tyson in his eponymous documentary currently screening there, another opus of self-reflective, crazy-ass candor has found increasing traction at the festival as well. Like Tyson, Nick Nolte: No Exit reportedly features an unadulterated one-on-one session with its subject, but boosts the stakes with the added integrity of an unprecedented Nolte-on-Nolte grilling:
Nolte is essentially trapped in an office with his own thoughts, often mumbling along in stream-of-consciousness soliloquies.More »
cannes film festival
Today in Cannes Hell: Spike Lee vs. The World, 'Che' Unveiled and Mouthbreathing Over Penelope Cruz
Only a few days remain before Cannes ends and we can roll our bleary eyes from the backs of our heads. In the meantime, the rubbernecker in us can't help but take an interest in Spike Lee's latest sortie against the Hollywood establishment — this time as personified by Cannes darling Clint Eastwood, whom Lee railed against while promoting his upcoming Afro-centric World War II drama Miracle at St. Anna:
"Clint Eastwood made two films about Iwo Jima that ran for more than four hours total and there was not one Negro actor on the screen," Lee told reporters. "If you reporters had any balls you'd ask him why. There's no way I know why he did that — that was his vision, not mine. But I know it was pointed out to him and that he could have changed it. It's not like he didn't know."More »
love triangles
Woody Allen's Seething Hatred For Ryan McStupidface Reynolds May Have Led To Scarlett Johansson's Cannes Absence
There's now another take on the story circulated yesterday by the Daily Mail claiming Scarlett Johansson's diva-like demands ultimately resulted in the actress failing to appear at the premiere of Woody Allen's new movie. From the LAT:
My source says all of Scarlett's Cannes requests/needs had been agreed on by April 27 — hair, makeup, security, hotel — and she was good to go. She'd done all the press for her new album — Anywhere I Lay My Head — and was on the final fitting for her Cannes premiere dress designed by Dolce & Gabanna.More »
young love
The Five Words Defining Cannes '08: 'Macaulay Culkin Group Sex Movie'
Just when we didn't think we could be muster interest in another dispatch from Cannes, along comes Spout's resourceful Karina Longworth with five words: "Macaulay Culkin group sex movie." Apparently Sex and Breakfast is among the hundreds of films screening at the Cannes market, featuring Culkin and Eliza Dushku (!) as a troubled Los Angeles couple consulting a sex therapist who prescribes open relationships to help liven things up. "After sex, I get this moment of clarity," Culkin says in closing, something he's likely pondered aloud before staring up a Peter Pan ceiling mural at Neverland Ranch. "Do you ever get that?" More »
cannes film festival
Today in Cannes Hell: Gwyneth Paltrow's Breast, Critic Riots and a Word with Charlie Kaufman
With the minor exception of missing out on Jim Toback's documentary on Mike Tyson (which will screen here this fall anyway — we can wait), the only regret we have so far about sitting out the Cannes Film Festival is our absence at the mini-riot that preceded the press screening of director James Gray's drama Two Lovers, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow. That's when we're at our best, as were Lou Lumenick and the "major U.S. film critic" (*cough* Manohla Dargis *cough*) who apparently exclaimed, "I'm not going to wait an hour for f—-ing James Gray" before an ensuing screening delay, shoving match and seating free-for-all. More »
cannes film festival
Shocker! Clint Eastwood and Angelina Jolie Make Oscar-Bait Drama Everybody Loves
Ho-hum. Clint Eastwood went to Cannes and all he got were more late-career raves, award mentions, his star Angelina Jolie on his arm and perhaps the most meta title switcheroo in Hollywood history: The Exchange (née Changeling) has all kinds of fans at the festival, where the child-disappearance drama premieres today in competition and already has Variety's Todd McCarthy running back at his hotel room to change his pants:More »
The intercutting of two heavyweight proceedings, a murder trial and a landmark City Hall hearing, provide the story's dramatic crescendo, although even greater tension stems from what comes thereafter. In the end, Changeling joins the likes of Chinatown and L.A. Confidential as a sorrowful critique of the city's political culture.
