Glamour Boys: Cannes Report, May 21, 2013
Steven Soderbergh’s “Behind the Candelabra” disappoints, Claire Denis’s “Bastards” baffles, and Mahamat-Saleh Haroun’s “Grisgris” is a mixed bag. So it goes sometimes at Cannes.
Festivals & Awards
Cannes’ Sha Na Na at Woodstock Moment: A Castle in Italy
The competition film “A Castle in Italy,” a lightweight comedy, seems strangely out of place.
Action, Laughs, Beauty: Cannes Report, May 20
Boos for Takashi Miike’s “Shield of Straw,” a muddled “Blind Detective” from Johnnie To and Paolo Sorrentino’s “The Great Beauty” lives up to its name.
Cannes: The Coen brothers
At Cannes, the Coen brothers discuss their inspirations for “Inside Llewyn Davis.”
Cannes Classics: Tip of “Fedora” to You
Billy Wilder’s under-appreciated 1978 “Fedora” returns to Cannes to remind us that some things, like the fear of aging among celebrities, never change.
Cannes reviews: Politics and troubled family lives in “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints,” “Blue Ruin,” and “Tip Top”
While Cannes’s red-carpet crowd toasts the Coen brothers’ tuneful “Inside Llewyn Davis,” the parallel programs have also turned a spotlight on America.
Violence, War, Death: Cannes Report, May 19
A day of grim films in which “Borgman” attempts Haneke-like surreal grimness and falls short, “The Missing Picture” and “Death March” turn artifice to their advantage to explore the horrors of war and loss, and Claude Lanzmann returns with a film about controversial figure Benjamin Murmelstein, the last president of the Jewish Council of Elders in the Theresienstadt ghetto.
Cannes reviews: Alejandro Jodorowsky returns with “The Dance of Reality” and “Jodorowsky’s Dune”
At Directors’ Fortnight, Alejandro Jodorowsky has one new feature and appears as the subject of another.
Rainy Day Blues: Cannes Report: May 18, 2013
After duds “Jimmy P.” and “Grand Central,” the Coen brothers’ “Inside Llewyn Davis” saves the day for Barbara Scharres.
Only Connect: Cannes Report, May 17
Asghar Farhadi (“A Separation”) returns with another look at unsolvable dilemmas, an erotic thriller goes all the way, and Hirokazu Kore-eda (“Nobody Knows”) tells another gentle tale of family life.
Cruisin’ Together: Cannes Day Three
Michał Oleszczyk falls for offbeat gay thriller “Stranger by the Lake” and gloriously eccentric essay-film “A Story of Children and Film.”
Cannes review: Marcel Ophüls puts his memoirs on film in “Ain’t Misbehavin (Un Voyageur)”
Two very different documentarians, Marcel Ophüls and Clio Barnard, premiere new work at Directors’ Fortnight.
Artifice and Real Life: Cannes Report, May 16, 2013
Barbara Scharres has a few choice words for François Ozon’s “Young & Beautiful” and Sofia Coppola’s “The Bling Ring,” but finds a gem in Ryan Coogler’s “Fruitvale Station.”
Cannes review: Ari Folman turns to sci-fi with “The Congress”
Ben Kenigsberg reviews the new sci-fi reverie from the director of “Waltz with Bashir.”
Breaking and Entering: Cannes Day Two
Michał Oleszczyk catches up with two takes on troubled youth: François Ozon’s “Young & Beautiful” and Sofia Coppola’s “The Bling Ring.”
To “Heli” with “Gatsby”: Cannes Day One
Michał Oleszczyk contrasts the opulent excess of opening night film “The Great Gatsy” with the grimmer realities of Amat Escalante’s “Heli.”
Opening Night: Cannes Report, May 15, 2013
Power is rarely discussed at Cannes, and it’s ostensibly all about
art, although careers can hang on critics’ approval, and whether films
are sold here, and to how many regions of the world. The annual jury
press conference on the opening day is the first and foremost love-fest
in which the concept of competition is downplayed and jurors find novel
ways to sidestep the question of comparing one film to another in order
to award the Palme d’Or in ten days.
Rival tendencies: As Steven Spielberg gets ready to chair this year’s Cannes jury, we prepare for an alterna-Cannes.
Ben Kenigsberg looks forward to the parallel programs at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.
