The gangs of Cannes

>> Scorsese vs. Weinstein, Michael Moore rocks the Croisette and El Topo is to be sequeled!

by MITCH DAVIS

Cannes. The only fitting way to write about such an electrifyingly chaotic event is to do so in disjointed bursts, like the half-remembered dream of a medicated insomniac. With that in mind, let’s go.

The Croisette is strange this year. The post-9/11 Cannes is a much safer, and subsequently less exciting place to be. Whereas last year’s fest was punctuated by muggings, fights and endless shouting in the streets, this year’s show is plagued with such intense police visibility that people really are on their best behaviour (although I did get to see someone carted off in an ambulance after attacking a car and getting his foot run over).

In a display of security bravado that puts Dorval Airport’s to shame, we are searched every time we enter an official Cannes building (outside of the market cinemas). People are visibly annoyed, but everyone tolerates it. Of course, these searches will do little to thwart potential industry-haters with grenades strapped to their torsos, but an effort is an effort.

The stalking public

One particularly creepy Cannes tradition is that of the relentless celebrity sight-seer. Go by any of the official Cannes hotels and you will see a HUGE crowd of onlookers—every age, every demographic—surrounding the place, and even perched on rooftops, hoping to see anyone at all. They stand for hours in the blistering sun, bathed in sweat and Gucci, gladly willing to suffer for a fleeting live glimpse of anyone deemed different from them. Could be an actor, could be a director, perhaps a producer, rock star, sports figure, VJ, maybe even a newscaster. I’ve never seen this sort of rabid and totally indiscriminate fandom anywhere else, and it is very freakish to watch.

Walk down the beach amidst the international pavilions and you will be pummelled by oddly-selected soundtrack music blaring through towering outdoor speakers. I made a phone call in a booth that was plastered with glamour images and reeked of dog shit while a speaker belted the electro-prison-rape-rock beats from Midnight Express. Everything about the Croisette seemed anchored in perfectly twisted balance.

The phone-hating filmmaker

Martin Scorsese was in town Monday to show a 20-minute promo reel of his forthcoming Gangs of New York. He went out of his way to assure everyone that life was indeed beautiful between him and Miramax honcho Harvey Weinstein, who pushed the film from its initial December release in order to cut its enormous running time down.

At the time, a rumoured incident had the filmmaker hanging up on Weinstein and smashing the phone to pieces against a wall. Since then, they have reached a compromise, wherein Scorsese agreed to make cuts but was allowed several days of reshoots to make the flow to his satisfaction. He is heading back to New York to continue editing, and has announced that he is very happy with the way things are shaping up now.

In the midst of the endless parade of superstars, nobody has a bigger buzz around him than confrontational documentarian Michael Moore, whose assault on American gun culture, Bowling for Columbine, has become the most talked about film in town. United Artists just picked it up for wide release. Somehow, I don’t think NRA head honcho Charlton Heston will be getting much sleep over the next few months. Moore is all over the media here, and deservedly so.

Sunday, May 19: David Lynch has been honoured with the title of Chevalier de la Legion d’honneur!

Breillat lambasted

Virtually everyone at Cannes is lambasting Catherine Breillat’s Sex Is Comedy. I haven’t seen it yet, but a part of me refuses to believe the vitriol—France really does relish destroying its heroes.

One French hero who will hopefully attain immortality is the gifted Gaspar Noé, whose competition film Irréversible is on the cover of everything in sight. Spoken of as a cross between Freeze Me and Taxi Driver, Noe’s latest (his long awaited second feature after incinerating audiences with Seul contre tous) marks the first time he has been afforded a real budget and stars who were willing to go all the way in the grit department. Everyone here is dying to be shocked by this one, with headlines cheerfully screaming “Scandal!” across images of star Monica Bellucci. None of us have any doubt that this one truly will deliver.

News of the decade: legendary surrealist provocateur Alejandro Jodorowsky has finally gotten his El Topo sequel off the ground and into pre-production. Jodorowsky has been trying to get this made since the late ’80s and has finally found backing through Before Night Falls producer Matthias Ehrenberg. Described as a “Post-post nuclear swashbuckler set in a medieval desert wilderness,” El Hijos Del Topo (Sons of El Topo) will be shot in Mexico. Cannes you dig it? :

Mitch Davis is a local filmmaker and a programmer for Montreal’s Fantasia Film Festival