So Cannes is underway, with Woody Allen‘s “Midnight In Paris” kicking things off, to surprisingly excellent notices — if you haven’t read our review yet, our man thought it was one of Allen’s best efforts in quite some time. But does it mean that the images and clips from the films unspooling in the South of France are done? Of course it doesn’t.
On the eve of its Cannes premiere, a bunch of new images have landed, courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics, from Gus Van Sant‘s latest, the teen drama “Restless.” The director’s coming off an Oscar nomination for “Milk,” so his follow up’s been eagerly anticipated by most, but things were mixed on the new project for a while: a twee trailer and a January release date didn’t bode well, but the film was yanked from the schedule by SPC, aiming for a Cannes berth, and it’ll finally premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of the festival tomorrow, so we’re feeling a little better about things now.
Seemingly a “Harold & Maude“-esque tale of a teenager (Henry Hopper, son of the late Dennis) who spends his time crashing funerals, and whose best friend is the ghost of a Japanese WW2 pilot. But his life is turned upside down when he meets a girl (“Alice in Wonderland” star Mia Wasikowska) at one of the funerals, and falls for her. But she has a secret, one that suggests that the burgeoning romance may not be a long-lasting one…
The images overwhelmingly focus on the two stars, along with a brief glimpse of Ryo Kase as the ghostly pilot Hiroshi, and a couple of behind-the-scenes snippets of Van Sant at work. What were you expecting, dinosaurs fighting aliens or something? We’ll have our own review of the film tomorrow, so we’ll find out if it’s in the director’s “My Own Private Idaho” territory, or if it’s something closer to “Finding Forrester.” And “Restless” will then hit theaters in the U.S. on September 16th.