Talk about a piece being way off! That’s the last time we listen to Variety (prolly not, but whateves). We just wrote how Charlie Kaufman’s “Synecdoche, New York,” was likely going to be the only American film competing at Cannes according to an article in Variety that looked like it had the inside track. Wrong!
The article also said [ed. sure, put the blame all on them] that former Cannes Palme d’Or winner Steven Soderbergh would not be ready with his four-hour epic Che Guevara double bill, “The Argentine” and “Guerrilla,” and neither would Woody Allen’s “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.” Wrong, wrong, wrong! (though Allen is not screening in competition as is his custom)
Today the Cannes line-up was revealed, and all of these films are screening in competition! Gip! Soderbergh had been allegedly holed away, furiously working on editing the two films (it was either that both screened or neither screened apparently) and it seriously looked like he ran out of time. Variety’s mea culpa is this.
“Soderbergh’s inclusion — he competes with “The Argentine” and “Guerrilla” — looks like a last-minute decision. For much of this week, there seemed genuine uncertainty as to whether he would be able to finish the two films by the time Cannes rolls.
Well, at least they were correct about Wim Wenders’ “The Palermo Shooting,” which stars Milla Jovovich, Dennis Hopper and Giovanna Mezzogiorno and Atom Egoyan’s latest, “Adoration” featuring Scott Speedman and Rachel Blanchard (and at least they were correct about Kaufman’s ‘Synecdoche,’ could you imagine?).
The other major American edition to the French film festival is Clint Eastwood’s “The Changeling,” starring Angelina Jolie as a woman searching for her missing son in 1920s Los Angeles. It’s also nice to hear that the great Brazilian filmmaker Walter Salles (“Central Station”) returns from making crappy American films back to South American social issues with “Linha de passe,” an urban road movie (which is going to be the test drive for his “On The Road,” Kerouac adaptation?)
Screening out of competition, but returning to Cannes is estimable Serbian filmmaker and former Palme d’Or winner Emir Kusturica with his film “Maradona” about disgraced Argentinean footballer (soccer player to you yanks).
Other films screening out of competition include “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,”by Steven Spielberg and James Toback look at Mike Tyson (“Tyson”).
The jury panel will be lead by Sean Penn and will include actors Natalie Portman, Alexandra Maria Lara and directors Alfonso Cuaron and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Quentin Tarantino isn’t premiering jack at Cannes, but the director will give a “master class on moviemaking to students and film buffs,” apparently.