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“I can respect the stupidity of people who think that speed is beauty,” agrees Paul Cox

The Australian film director Paul Cox, spoke to a group of students earlier this afternoon. While I ‘ve met Cox a few times before at the annual Ebertfest in Champaign-Urbana, IL, I’d never heard him speak freely to a crowd and was interested in what would be said. Paul enters in casual clothes and walks to the seat in front of the class, unfolds a few pages of yellow papers full of scribbly handwriting and begins speaking in a soft, slow, accented voice.

The title of the speech is “Invent not Imitate,” encouraging our generation to break the rules and push the limits. So at first, of course, I’m into it. Slowly, the speech turns from an encouraging nudge towards originality and prioritizing values, to a pretty full blown revolutionary anarchist speech.

There is a pessimistic rant about the lack of genuineness and how many artists are “rubbish,” specifically at this film festival. Cox rags on any one who even considers the nearby Monaco Grand Prix and car racing relevant or acceptable, and then stomps on organized religion, ex-president Bush, fashion and films like “Pulp Fiction.” A student in the crowd asks Paul if there was anything he thought was worth doing, seeing or knowing about and beyond Cox’s personal hero, Vincent Van Gogh and some rural Aboriginal tribes with which he’d spent time. It seemed he was not.

“If you’re not at the top, then you just…you just do better!

Roger Ebert

May 21–I am my Grandmother’s dinner date on a friend’s yacht. We walk down to the pier where all of the fancy yachts are docked. There are plastic signs hung from the front of the boats with the names of the company renting them for the night. Women are strutting up and down this pier like it’s a runway! They’re dressed up in expensive dresses and even more expensive heels, which aren’t even allowed on the boats. Most of the boats are rented out for company parties, but others are privately owned by billionaires like Roberto Cavalli who can afford the hefty price tag of a docking space.

Since the boat we’re going to isn’t docked, we’re meeting a smaller speed boat to take us out to it. It’s pretty windy outside and we’re having trouble finding the small boat at the pier. After 20 minutes of walking around and asking if anyone’s name is Luke (the boat operator) we finally find him. Apparently we’re at the wrong pier for a pick-up, but Luke is willing to pull my grandma along this 7′ X 5′ floating platform into his small speed boat.

My grandma is hilariously skeptical. She thinks about it for a few minutes, while the platform is sliding and bobbing around on top of the intense waves. “I have to walk across that?” she says. Luke tries to be persuasive, but even he’s not buying that his manouever is completely safe. With a “I’m not falling into that water and drowning!” my grandma decides to meet Luke on the other end of the pier where there’s a proper docking area.

Aujourd’hui il pleut

Friday, May 15–Today it rains, which changes everything. Yesterday the air was so European with cigarette smoke and hints of ocean musk. Today the air is damp, humid and rainy. A little sad. My first full day at Cannes! This afternoon the American Pavillion named their Conference Center in honor of grandfather. He has done a lot of Q and As and interviews there. There was tons of press, and Martin Scorsese was there to do the dedication. Everyone was excited and full of this nervous anxiety to do their jobs right at all costs. Afterwards in the Green Room, I had the honor of meeting the director of the festival, Thierry Frémaux. I also met some great friends of my grandfather’s, the very French Pierre Rissient, who he just wrote about; the Australian director Paul Cox, Uma and Gerson da Cunha from India. These were only a few of the people touched by grandfather’s genuine personality and devotion to the art of cinema.

Iranian filmmakers take center stage

Barbara Scharres

May 18 — Some Cannes traditions never die. In the years I’ve been coming to the festival, the same music has been playing in the Grand Theatre Lumiere before the early morning press screening. It’s always jazz, and it always seems to be the same selection every morning, every year. I’ve started to imagine that there’s some ancient reel-to-reel tape recorder in a distant control booth, and that a guard is assigned to rewind and start the old tape at 8:00 am each day.

Sound or more specifically, language is central to Jean-Luc Godard’s “Film Socialism.” Roger has commented so thoroughly on that film that I’m not going to add much, except to say that Godard remains one of the grand tricksters of world cinema. With his French dialogue, minimal and cryptic subtitles in so-called “Navajo English” (this in itself seems a tongue-in-cheek fiction on his part), and bits of a few other languages thrown in, he creates a Babel that I believe was made to baffle and intrigue one and all, no matter what your native tongue. It’s a kind of rarefied fun to try to decipher, and maddening at the same time. Meanwhile, Godard the magician, like the wizard in “The Wizard of Oz,” gets to hide behind his screen, sending out big ideas and big images.

Above: Abbas Kiarostami (AP photo)

Overturning expectations: The ups and downs

Barbara Scharres

May 16 — Sunday was a day of highs and lows, of new discoveries and dashed hopes. Bertrand Tavernier and Takeshi Kitano, two directors whose films I had most anticipated here, did not live up to my expectations with “The Princess of Montpensier” and “Outrage,” respectively. Hungarian Agnes Kocsis, a director who had only made one previous feature in 2006, blew me away with her insightful “Adrienn Pal.”

I walk the red carpet with no ticket

Tonight’s premiere movie is Ang Lee’s “Taking Woodstock,” starring one of my favorite comedians Demetri Martin. Although I don’t have a formal invitation to the red carpet premiere, I’ve decided to try my luck getting into the screening on different terms. Many companies give away extra tickets to the young people who stand outside the Palais with signs requesting them. Although it’s not imperative that I see the movie at it’s premiere, I think the experience will be fun whether or not I actually get a ticket.

Technically, I can see the movie tomorrow afternoon in a smaller theatre without this hassle. I just won’t get to walk the red carpet, see Emile Hirsch (and Ang Lee), take pictures, dress up–and basically it won’t be as good. Fingers crossed!

I GOT IN!

I arrived outside of the Palais all dressed up at 9 pm for the 10 o’ clock showing of “Taking Woodstock.” I made a sign using a sheet of paper from a legal pad and an ink pen, saying “Invitation to Taking Woodstock, SVP! ☺.”

I’m doing some version of “great”

Raven Evans, a Cannes first-timer, will be a sophomore at Pomona College this September.

Thursday, May 14–It might be assumed that a first entry, like this one, be a fairly formal introduction. As a student at a small liberal arts college, I now see formal introductions as an overrated formality. For example, the box to the right of this text will inform you that I am my parent’s child, and that I am a teenage student.

My most recent experience with introductions in large quantities was the first two weeks on my college’s campus. I spent this time shaking hands and answering the same three questions about myself over and over; 80% of the time I knew the answers to all the questions I intended to ask. Most likely, I recognized a face and name from doing some research on some social networking website, and considering they are attending one of the best liberal arts colleges in America, I’m sure they are doing some version of “great.”

I have lunch with the mayor

Barbara Scharres

May 20, 2009-The premiere of Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Basterds” will likely dominate the international press for days. The screening itself was a bit less than a crazy event than I had been expecting. After experiencing the wild, all-out adoration of Tarantino fans at a special Cannes screening of “Kill Bill I and II” some years ago, in which the audience consisted largely of French locals, I was prepared for anything.

The guards opened the Grand Theatre Lumiere a half-hour early, and even though I arrive at 7:55 am for the 8:30 am screening, it was already half full. Mild excitement was in the air, some cheers and applause were heard as the lights went down, and another smattering of applause when Tarantino’s name appeared on the screen.

I was waiting for some kind of massive reaction at the end, but there really was nothing out of the ordinary. I’ve never been overwhelmed by Tarantino’s films, although the crazed eclecticism of his work is a lot of fun. “Inglourious Basterds” worked for me as a satisfying whole better than most of his other films. He pulls together everything in his arsenal: action, extreme violence, misogyny, film history, pop music and pop culture, and a plot based on a wild premise that rewrites history.

Window shopping: Best show in town

Barbara Scharres

Window-shopping is daily the source of one of the best free shows in Cannes. There’s nothing quite like walking around this town, even if it’s just a brief walk between screening rooms, and ogling what could be bought if you had millions of dollars at your disposal: the most extravagant flower arrangements, the most colorful and sumptuous pastries, piles of diamond necklaces, strapless cocktail dresses with skirts of white marabou feathers or silver palettes, ice-cream-pastel Chanel suits with glittering sequin trim.  The loot of the world’s fashion runways is displayed in all its theatrical and expensive glory in the shops that face the Croisette, and most of these outfits would look outlandish anyplace but right here in Cannes.

A fake paparazzi, lots of films, funny stories, and I walk the red carpet

Roger Ebert

The daily total of times I’ve been body slammed by someone or almost run over by a car are slowly decreasing as my days at Cannes increase. Being at Cannes takes some adjusting, but I now feel like I can flaunt my knowledge of all things Cannes. I’ve learned a lot about this festival since I’ve arrived. I’ve finally learned the complicated class system at Cannes that is exhibited through badges. It begins with a Cinephile pass, then Festival, then Marché and on to the highly coveted Press badges. Of those the best is the white press badge that allows access to private screenings and tickets to every premiere.

I would like to retract my statement about Cannes being all about having a good time. The business that happens at this festival is what keeps it around. The market in the lower level of the Palais where companies buy and sell films is always busy, and over the years several films have been famously sold over dinner or lunch in one of the fabulous hotel restaurants.

Indy in the Riviera sunshine

Chaz Ebert

Steven Spielberg, Harrison Ford and George Lucas bring “Indiana Jones” to Cannes. (AP photo)

Dear Roger,

The weather gods smiled on Steven Spielberg and George Lucas for their world premiere of “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” Crowds gathered in the Riviera sun, some of them with signs pleading, “S’il vous plait, I NEED tickets for Indiana Jones!” There was a screening scheduled for 1 p.m., for both the press and the official invitation holders. In the past mixing the two has spelled disaster for a movie so highly anticipated; usually the screenings are separate, so the black tie crowd doesn’t hear the possible snickers of the critics. Today I expected a crowd, so I got to the Palais des Festivals much earlier than usual, but to no avail. The guards told me it was complet!

A teacher wins the Cannes film festival

Chaz Ebert

Director Laurent Cantet accepts the Palme d’Or, surrounded by his cast.

For the first time in 21 years, a French film has taken the top prize at the Cannes film festival, and in a rarity for Cannes, the Palme d’Or was awarded unanimously. The prize could have easily been named “The Golden Apple” rather than the The Golden Palm since it went to “The Class” (“Entre Les Murs”), the Laurent Cantet film about a young teacher who tries to reach his class of primarily immigrant children in a school on the outskirts of Paris. Confronted with their apathy and sometimes outright hostility, he questions them in a Socratic fashion until they begin to ask themselves if perhaps an education might be relevant to them. This film moved me to tears and so of course I thought that, in the grand tradition of Cannes, it had no chance of winning the top prize.

Alone in the ring at Cannes

Chaz Ebert

Mike Tyson in James Toback’s documentary.

CANNES, France — Roger, when we talked about sending you messages from the film festival I never expected that my first would be about a heavyweight boxer. Mike Tyson’s grip was surprisingly gentle when he shook my hand, and his voice soft and polite on stage, but there was nothing gentle, soft or polite about the images onscreen here in “Tyson,” James Toback’s documentary about his life. It is a compelling character study. His life is a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions.

My Dinner with Clint

Chaz Ebert

Kyle and Alison Eastwood with their father Clint on a big night out in Cannes.

Dear Roger,

I’ve just returned from the official dinner given by the Festival for Clint Eastwood’s movie. I felt like Cinderella at the ball. The dinner was held at the swanky Restaurant La Palme d’Or on the Croisette. I wore my long evening gown just like all the French women wear at night. That’s usually the last thing you want to do after watching movies all day, and most of the American women journalists skip the gowns, but I am a hybrid this year, not quite journalist and not quite guest. Besides, this was a special evening and I wanted to make a good showing for you.