While not every film that premieres at Cannes goes on to a stellar career, it is the go-to place to test the pulse of the industry. Cannes 2012 is still on a high after premiering THE ARTIST last year, a silent French film that went all the way to the Oscars. Of course, many Cannes films crashed and burned during the year as well, but somehow the successes seem all the more influential and that makes the event an indispensable one for buyers and sellers in the marketplace. Aside from the glitter of the Festival fare, there is a parallel film market where less stellar fare is hawked and sold, adding to the event’s must-attend status.
Pilgrims to the semi-religious event are already talking up some of the high profile premieres from the likes of filmmakers Lee Daniels, Carlos Reygadas, Andrew Dominik, Abbas Kiarostami, Wes Anderson, Hong Sang-soo, and Ken Loach in the main competition lineup. Bernardo Bertolucci’s new film ME AND YOU, a dark tale about a young man helping his half-sister to beat heroin addiction, is screening out of competition. Two highly anticipated films will screen as midnight events: Japanese cult director Takashi Miike’s THE LEGEND OF LOVE AND SINCERITY and Italian horror master Dario Argento’s version of DRACULA. The Thai auteur Apichatpong Weerasethakul, a Palme d’Or winner for his ghost parable UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES, has a special screening for his new project, MEKONG HOTEL. Also returning to the main competition is Austrian director Michael Haneke’s latest AMOUR, with Festival favorite Isabelle Huppert playing a woman who has a volatile relationship with her elderly parents, played by screen veterans Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva. An oddball film that just might be one of the highlights this year is RUST AND BONE, a French/Quebec co-production adapted from the 2005 short story collection by the Canadian author Craig Davidson. The film stars Oscar winner Marion Cotillard in a tale about a bareknuckle fighter and someone who has lost their limbs to a whale being trained in a marine show park.
Other films generating early buzz are THE HUNT, the latest from Danish dogma director Thomas Vinterberg, which stars Mads Mikkelsen as a divorced man in a small country town who is accused of abusing a child; DL, the newest film bonbon from French director Leos Carax; and PARADIES, a sure-to-be-controversial dramatic diptych about the strange journeys of a mother and daughter by Austrian auteur Ulrich Seidl. A new film from 89-year-old French film master Alain Resnais is an extraordinary achievement in and of itself. Screening in the competition section, YOU HAVEN’T SEEN ANYTHING YET, a loose reworking of French playwright Jean Anouilh’s tale of Orpheus and Eurydice, features a group of actors gathered in the house of a dead dramatist, awaiting the reading of his will. The movie features a blue-chip French cast, including Michel Piccoli, Mathieu Amalric, Anne Consigny and Lambert Wilson. The continued agility and wit of Resnais’s creativity is a marvel…..his presence at Cannes is always a treat. For more information on these and other films premiering, visit the website: http://www.festival-cannes.fr/en/festival.html