The Cannes Report: An American Critic on the French Riviera

Cannes selection:

Prize-winners, pretty young things, and tales of sex and violence

International as it may be, the festival remains a distinctly French-flavoured affair (ask anyone who’s waited on line with pontificating French film critics or tried to negotiate with a haughty Parisian publicist). With France’s presidential election just 10 days earlier, the mood on the Croisette is likely to be electric (particularly if Socialist François Hollande ousts unpopular incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy).

Of course, the most important thing is the cinema. Away from the sun-baked Mediterranean beaches, the ultra-exclusive soirées, the red carpet and the gaggles of exuberant stargazers and dogged paparazzi that line it, Cannes is an experience lived out in the dark; the bottom line is the big, beautiful movie screen and the obsessive film lovers gazing up at it.
This year’s competition slate is enticing: a mix of world cinema heavyweights and offbeat auteurs, with a few wild cards thrown in for good measure.

So let’s kick off the countdown to Cannes (two weeks to go!) with a closer look at the main selection. Here are three initial observations.

1) A line-up of prize-winners and prodigy
2) Stories of sex and violence, love and death

3) Lightweights step up to the big leagues

Certainly, Cosmopolis fits in the second observation!

Read and see more here: www.cannesreport.blogs.france24.com

Source: www.spunk-ransom.com