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Cannes Main Competition: Kitano, Bouchareb, Chang-dong and Tavernier
With a Gangster film, WWII tale, Old Asian lady portrait and a period piece in the Main Competition you'd think we'd be talking about last year's batch of films: e.g.: Mother, Basterds and Bright Star. Not a recycling of story ideas, but rather same genres, among the surprise films below being nominated in the category, I was expecting Tavernier to occupy an Out of Comp or Special Screening slot.
Cannes Main Competition: Inarritu, Im Sang-soo, Luchetti and Beauvois
Twenty-five percent of the filmmakers selected in the Main Competition are of French origin with Beauvois being one of the four selected. Of the four listed below, I'm most surprised to see Im Sang-soo selected in this category - which means that the film is a lot better than what I may have anticipated.
Cannes Main Competition: Leigh, Kiarostami, Mikhalkov and Liman
Although it was expected since Cannes "hearts" Sean Penn, Doug Liman must be pinching himself over the news of being included in the Main Competition, and in the company of the three names of Leigh, Kiarostami and Mikhalkov. After all, when you consider he made Jumper, then Fair Game might be a powerful political film. Out of today's 16 films named in the Main Comp (still at least 5 or maybe 6 more films to be named at a later date), it would appear that Mikhalkov's might be in the running for the longest run time. Here are four of the 16.
Blue Valentine: Love Story to Unfold in the Croisette’s Un Certain Regard Section
Whenever a film that performs well at Sundance and then skips out on Berlin, SXSW and the select indie films fest in the following months, it's because there is a distinct chance at a premiere at the behemoth film festival in May. As I specified here, I was thinking Blue Valentine would follow in the same footsteps as Lee Daniels' Precious, and indeed, Derek Cianfrance's Park City triumph will be part of the Un Certain Regard section -- a major showcase/platform for the film to pretty much sell out in whatever remaining territories that have been lazy in picking up this film.
This Must be the Place for Frances McDormand
After doing a double take when it was announced she'd be joining Transformers part trois, Frances McDormand is back into more familiar genre items as she has just joined a project that has been "dormant" since it was announced at last year's Cannes film festival. McDormand will be joining Sean Penn (he hasn't bailed on this one yet) in Paolo Sorrentino's English language directorial debut.
