Isabelle Huppert (“I Heart Huckabee’s“) has been named the Jury President of the 62nd Annual Cannes Film Festival. Does this spell trouble for Quentin Tarantino‘s WWII epic, “Inglourious Basterds” that is scheduled to hopefully appear at the prestigious film festival in May?
Why? Well, What transpired seems to be somewhat muddled, but the gist of it is: there is bad blood between Huppert and the motormouth American director.
The story goes that Huppert was Tarantino’s first choice to play the character of Madame Mimieux, an older cinematheque owner who provides shelter to the films Jewish-French protagonist Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent). At first, some claimed that Huppert was fired, but it appears that she was offered, but never given the role. Meetings between the two of them were missed by Huppert or she was late and what QT perceived as her lack of enthusiasm for the role made him decide to ultimately look elsewhere (Maggie Cheung eventually got the role despite not being French). Huppert eventually defended herself, claiming he was never 100% committed to the role and was never late to any meetings (French icon Catherine Deneuve apparently turned down the role as well).
But, will ‘Basterds’ play out of competition at Cannes and no one will have to worry about any potential jury bias or personal feelings entering the voting?
The direction that QT’s movies have been moving in recent years – towards stylized movies, rather than stylized cinema, more Cannes-friendly films – suggests ‘Basterds’ will screen out of awards competition (if it is indeed done on time), but who knows. We’ll all just have to wait until Cannes time to find out what happens.
[via Variety]
