Two films in competition last night (Monster And The return), two new ones today (Youth And Black Flies) and stars falling like so many shooting stars on the Croisette. It’s only Thursday and the Cannes Film Festival has already picked up its stride.
Today’s event: Harrison Ford’s der
The fifth part ofIndianaJones, the first not directed by Steven Spielberg but by James Mangold, and the last shot by Harrison Ford, promise, swear. And to think Indiana Jones might not have been him. Steven Spielberg wanted it, but George Lucas was not keen: at the time, in 1980, he feared confusion with Han Solo, his character from Star Wars. For this new project imagined together, the two men approached Nick Nolte, Jeff Bridges, Bill Murray, before choosing Tom Selleck, still little known. But the latter withdrew at the last moment to take on the role of Magnum. Spielberg then returned to the charge and was finally able to convince Lucas that Harrison Ford was their man.
The controversy of the day: A “Return” not so agitated
Abuse? Problematic sex scenes? The return to Cannes of Catherine Corsini with The returnTwo years later The divide, was going to be complicated. Mea culpa from the director who felt at a press conference that she would be “more careful with her actors in the future”. The actors of the film have, them, put forward the “benevolence” of the director and the team towards them. The day before, producer Elisabeth Perez, his companion, had taken care to defuse the controversy so that the party was as little spoiled as possible. “Catherine is extremely distressed. At times, she is rash, she admitted, but she is not mean, there is no evil”. “The people who had a bad experience of filming, Catherine never raised her voice against them”, she further underlined, reporting only “a few arguments with her first assistant about work”. But Elisabeth Perez assures that she cannot explain the “relentlessness” as soon as the possible selection of the film at Cannes is announced: “we are women, there is a team that is 70% female. The most vocal people are boys. It questions, it questions. “We too, we can say that we were harassed, under pressure. We were hurt, we hope that the cinema will take precedence. The film is miles away from all the slightly disgusting things we’ve heard about us. This had no consequence on the selection of the film in competition, but nevertheless prompted the CNC to withdraw its financial support, leaving a hole of around 400,000 euros in the film’s budget.
Photo of the day: They love each other against all odds
The indiscretion of the day: Michael Douglas in all intimacy
When it comes to sex scenes, Michael Douglas is on the lookout. During a masterclass organized in his honor, the 78-year-old actor joked that he had become “an expert in the field”. His secret? “Rehearsals,” he said. It’s like when you rehearse a fight scene, you have to work out the choreography. You start very slowly and then you get into a faster pace. Don’t tell him about the “intimacy coordinators” that have popped up in recent years to reassure actors during intimate scenes. The actor has a method of his own to put his partner in confidence. “When you’re doing a love scene, it’s important that the actress doesn’t think you’re taking advantage of the situation. You tell him upstream: I’m going to put my hand here, you put your hand there and then we kiss, “added the actor. “If you succeed, it will seem spontaneous, while everything is very well choreographed,” said Michael Douglas, whose addiction to sex at the time of Basic Instinct in 1992, got him to do cure.
The number of the day: 212 (minutes)
This is not the length of the longest kiss, but of the longest film in the competition. Youth, documentary by Chinese Wang Bing, accustomed to river films on the marginalized of his country, depicts in 3h32 the life of textile workers in a city 150 kilometers from Shanghai. After Laura Poitras (All the beauty and the bloodshed) in Venice and Nicolas Philibert (On the Adamant) in Berlin, a documentary could win the prize for what would then appear to be the grand slam of cinema for a genre that is arousing a clear revival of interest.
Quote of the day: “Who is the monster? »
Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda had the honor of being the first to present his film in competition: Monster, a drama about school bullying. The film is first told from the teacher’s point of view and then from that of his student. “I wanted the viewer to be able to search, the same way the characters do in the film, who is the monster? It happens to be a primary school, but when an institution puts protecting themselves at the top of their priorities, it doesn’t matter what really happened, “said the director, palmé d’or at Cannes for A family matterthus taking up one of the school principal’s lines.
To be continued tomorrow: “Vincent must die”… really?
Black comedy mixed with fantasy, Vincent must die by Stephan Castaing arrives in Cannes preceded by an excellent reputation. The film, starring Karim Leklou and Vimala Pons, is to be discovered tomorrow at Critics’ Week. 20 minutes will be there!