When do the organizers of the Cannes film festival revoke the VIP card? When does the red carpet become off limits to folks who’ve worn out their welcome. Thus should be the case for German filmmaker Wim Wenders who received a Cannes main competition invite for his latest feature – a road movie that Variety described as “pretentious and inconsequential”, and that many colleagues of mine walked out during the mid way mark of the official screening. With the exception of the Ry Cooder motivated docu film on Cuban musicians Buena Vista Social Club, many would argue that we haven’t had anything to cheer about in the Wenders camp since 1987’s Wings of Desire.
Among the five or so pictures that I did not bother with in the competition titles at Cannes this year is The Palermo
Shooting – a drama with wheels about a successful photographer Finn who is experiencing an existential crisis.
Finn’s quest for an answer to the meaning of life sends him on a journey from Düsseldorf to Palermo – and along the way he finds a new love.
Cannes is extra courteous to this filmmaker – Wenders was part of the Chacun son cinema collection with a bit about a screening of Black Hawk Down in Congo….but the Wenders of before (The American
Friend and Paris, Texas) has been replaced by the Wenders of the present with The Million Dollar Hotel, Land of Plenty and Don’t Come
Knocking. Something needs to change.
Here are some pictures of Dennis Hopper, Giovanna Mezzogiorno and Andreas Frege taken just prior to the Cannes press conference.
