“Climax”
Gaspar Noe is no stranger to Cannes. The Argentine filmmaker has shown all four of his feature films, including “I Stand Alone,” “Irreversible,” “Enter the Void” and “Love,” at the premiere film festival, and sure enough, the controversial filmmaker will now show his latest film, “Climax,” there too. Details are exceptionally limited at this time, so it’s hard to know what Gaspar cooked up with this time. And with his mixed track record, it’s hard to know if this one is a brilliant masterpiece or a repellent shock-seeker, but we’ll be curious to see it all the same. When he’s at his best, Gaspar Noe is among the most daring and intriguing filmmakers in filmmaking today. At his worst, he’s… well, certainly not a fun time at the movies. That’s for sure. With such limited details, it’s hard to know where “Climax” will swing, but it’s promising to be big. We hope Noe produces something appropriately stimulating. – WA
“BlacKkKlansman”
Spike Lee makes provocative, conversation-starting films. There’s no doubt about it. At his best, Lee is a resilient, ferociously uncompromising storyteller, known to make the type of films which remain in our collective conscious for many years to come. That’s what makes his underwhelming string of recent films fairly disappointing. While 2015’s “Chi-Raq” was a messy but engaging satire, it didn’t make the impact that it should have. Similarly, 2014’s Kickstarter backed “Da Sweet Blood of Jesus” came and went, while 2013’s “Old Boy” remake was a let-down and “Red Hook Summer” was instantly forgotten. That’s what makes the promise of “BlacKkKlansman” so damn invigorating. Produced by Jordan Peele and Jason Blum, and starring John David Washington, Adam Driver, Corey Hawkins and Topher Grace, “BlacKkKlansman” has provoked conversations ever since it was announced, and the first footage out of CinemaCon assured us that it needed to be on our radar. Sure enough, we expect lots of people will talk about its Cannes premiere. When it hits theaters on August 10th, it should light a spark. – WA
“Cold War”
Even before he further made his mark with the excellent and stunningly shot “Ida” which debuted at the 2013 Toronto Film Festival, director Pawel Pawlikowski had managed to establish himself as a formidable filmmaker, particular with his film “My Summer of Love” starring Emily Blunt. “Ida”, however, made waves, ultimately winning Best Foreign Picture at the Oscars. With “Cold War,” Pawlikowski travels from Poland to Berlin, Yugoslavia and Paris, following a passionate love story between two people who are tragically mismatched in every aspect of life, aside from their love for one another, all set against the backdrop of the Cold War in the 1950s. It’s little to go on but considering the understated and moving work that the director has accomplished in the past, there’s little that needs to be said to convince us that anything Pawlikowski does from here on out is worth racing to. – AJ
“Happy As Lazzaro”
Italian film director Alice Rohrwacher is no stranger to Cannes and she’s had major success out of the gate. Her first feature film “Heavenly Body,” premiered at the Directors’ Fortnight during the 2011 edition of the festival to critical acclaim and her second feature film, “The Wonders“—starring her sister actress Alba Rohrwacher—won the Grand Prix at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Not too shabby. Her latest, “Happy As Lazzaro” stars Adriano Tardiolo, Luca Chikovani, Sergi López and Alba once again and centers on a tale of a meeting between a young, seemingly simple-minded peasant, and a young nobleman cursed by his imagination. A loyal bond is sealed when the nobleman asks the young boy to help him orchestrate his own kidnapping. It’s a tale about friendship with obviously a twist of intrigue. Rohrwacher has quickly proven herself to be a modern auteur worth keeping an eye on, so you should do the same here. – Rodrigo Perez
“Shoplifters”
As Yasujirō Ozu similarly achieved before him, director Hirokazu Kore-eda is a master filmmaker when it comes to capturing raw and unfiltered humanistic moments on film without ever making it feel trite or heavy-handed. Even with a lackluster prior entry which received little notice at the 2017 Toronto Film Festival with “The Third Murder”, he’s spent the better part of the century knocking one instant classic out after another. From “Our Little Sister” and “Like Father, Like Son” to “Still Walking,” “After the Storm,” and “Nobody Knows”, few directors possess the same level of skill and innate sense of human connection and their valleys of warmth. “Shoplifters” returns him to form after his dalliance with crime stories in “The Third Murder” as it tracks a family of small-time thieves who take in a child that they find on the street. It’s hard to glean much out of such a simple and concise premise, but anyone who knows the filmmakers oeuvre knows that tremendous moments of familial bonds and poignant storytelling have come from the smallest of moments in his films. – AJ
