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We love Cannes. All that is great about cinema and bad about white loafers is on display here. Once you get beyond the alcohol poisoning and status anxiety, you can see some really wonderful films (not that most people admit to watching films in our business). Normally you can enjoy some sunshine too, but Cannes 2012 will be remembered for relentless rain, and the biggest dealmakers in town were the street-side umbrella salesmen.
What of the films? This year Cannes brought its A-team. Jacques Audiard, David Cronenberg, Leos Carax, Walter Salles, Alain Resnais, Christian Mungiu, Ken Loach, John Hillcoat, Wes Anderson, Matteo Garrone, Andrew Dominik and Abbas Kiarostami all had new work in competition.
Cannes 2012 will be remembered for relentless rain, and the biggest dealmakers in town were the street-side umbrella salesmen
‘Killing them Softly’ was a superbly pessimistic crime film that treats murder as a brutal, middle-management chore. It’s darkly comic, if at times a little heavy-handed, and Brad Pitt gets to utter a brilliant final line.
Marion Cotillard and Matthias Schoenaerts make a beautiful odd couple in Jacques Audiard’s ‘Rust and Bone’. It’s a modern day Beauty and the Beast story, stunningly acted and featuring the best version of Bruce Springsteen’s ‘State Trooper’ heard in a long time.
The real joy was Leo Carax’s ‘Holy Motors’. It’s beyond surreal, but there are moments of pure invention here that make you remember why you love film. Check out the way Denis Lavant smokes. You will want to light up.
The Palme d’Or went to Michael Haneke for ‘Amour’. This latest extreme examination of the human condition was a deserving winner. By the way, what better place is there than Cannes, the epicenter of the superficial, to watch a film by the master of all that is frighteningly real?
We leave you with a short interview with the great man himself (with thanks to cine-fils.com). This highlights some of his consistent themes and talks especially about his thoughts to the depiction of violence, which is interesting to hear these days.