Leaving Cannes, up before the sun, I climb bleary-and-red-eyed into the taxi....

and, on the radio, Halls and Oates sing Maneater.



Au revoir.

"I'm on a boat...."

Behind the Palais is a harbor full of yachts – everything from wooden sailing ships to sleek, high tech white monstrosities complete with satellite dishes, radar, and sometimes (strangely) stuffed lions.


Before heading into the red carpet event, the Producer and I walked along the harbor. I wondered aloud what it must cost – per day – to hire one of these yachts. And then I saw it:

The Chicago International Film Festival has a yacht?! WTF? How does the CIFF finagle a triple-decker yacht?

“Let’s see if we can get on,” the Producer says.

“I don’t think we’re on the list,” but I am more than happy to nod my encouragement. I’ll watch.

The Captain happens to be standing dockside. “What does it take to get on the boat?” she asks him.

“You have to have an invitation or know someone who’s got one,” he says matter-of-factly.

“Oh, we know someone on there,” she says in her most optimistic Midwestern tone.

“You do, do you?”

“Sure. We’re from Chicago!” (soooooo, we must know SOMEone on there…)

“And who would that be?”

“Betsy,” she offers.

Oh, shit – I think: Betsy? Betsy?!?! Who’s named Betsy anymore!!

The Captain appears honestly surprised. “How do you know, Betsy?”

“Oh,” the Producer says. Clearly she didn’t really think there’d be a Betsy on there either…. But gamely she presses on: “Of course, we know Betsy!”

He looks at us as if to say: Don’t fuck with me, then adds: “Betsy is my wife.”

The Producer and I share a panicked look and I’m not who sure who suggests sending a copy of our Short Film up to the boat to prove our Chicago pedigree to folks onboard.

To cut to the chase, it turns out that someone onboard has agreed, based on the DVD to let us join the party on the yacht. (A party that seems very subdued.) We are asked to remove our shoes, given claim tickets and allowed on the yacht.

Mimi, the person behind the person behind the person running this soirée (come to Cannes and you suddenly realize how many French words are used to describe partying of various kinds….), introduces herself. With a bemused smile, she lets us upstairs.

While I am content to take the open table and oh-golly-don’t-want-to-impose-on-the- conversation, the Producer swings a chair around from another table for me and sits on a cushioned bench with one of the four people animatedly talking about the films of the Coen Brothers. “Really. I just couldn’t get into Barton Fink.”

I sit down and nod to the folks who give us the “who are you two?” look

“That one with Brad Pitt….” the man who will turn out to be an executive with Facets Multimedia in Chicago lobs out.

“’Burn This!’” I eagerly offer (I do all but raise my hand in the air and go “Oh, oh! Me!”) Wait! Shit, that’s the Lanford Wilson play John Malkovich and Joan Allen did in Chicago.

“’Burn Notice,’” the Producer corrects.

“Ah, yes,” everyone agrees with a collective smile: Burn Notice.

And then, something mildly magical happens…. We’re in the middle of a discussion of film. We all discuss our enthusiasms. We start talking the difference between film bashing and film criticism (and the endangered species of critic embodied by Roger Ebert. (As if on cue, as we’re talking, Michael Philips, film critic from the Chicago Tribune descends the ladder from the upper deck and heads down the gangplank to collect his shoes before either of us can say anything.))

I look around, breathe in the cool late spring air of the Mediterranean and think: I’m not just on a boat, m***erf***er.… I’m on a film boat!

Photo Miscellany

Wardrobe malfunctions

Those of you who followed the blog last year may remember “The Infamous Tuxedo Shoe Incident” involving evening wear and Super Glue.

Well, as this photo proves the shoe situation has been resolved: new shoes.

BUT as I began preparing for the first evening, slipping my bowtie through the appropriate collar fitting, the threads holding the collar to the shirt succumbed to fatigue or the hot press of the dry cleaner. Merde!!

I was looking like some silent film character with one side of my collar saluting…. Kudos to French hotels for still having buried in a remote corner of a desk drawer an oh-so teeny-tiny traveling sewing kit with needle and white thread (also black, blue and red)! Sacre bleu!

While the Producer waited downstairs with the shuttle van to the city center, I quickly sewed the collar tab back in place, zipped the bow tie in, shrugged on the jacket and headed out the door. Magnifique!

Now all I have to do is worry about what happens if I ever make it back.

SPOILER ALERT! Or Four Suggestions for Liberal Filmmakers

I should have liked Fair Game, the new film with Sean Penn and Naomi Watts, playing Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame – and certainly there are some things I liked about it that made it a worthwhile film to see.

As a Progressive (I usually use the term Liberal but ever since Glenn Simpering-Mama’s-Boy Beck has turned Progressive into a fetish, I’ll wear the label with pride), I walked into the movie predisposed to sympathize with the main characters based on what I have read about the case…. But for a film that uses the word truth with and without a capital “T”, and with and without ironic quotation marks, it left me more angry at its failures than admiring of either its message or characters.

The acting is great. The cinematography suits a Hollywood blockbuster. They spent some bucks on this – and maybe that’s part of the problem too: what it attempts to polish cleanly comes across as glib and a bit too easy.

The film has a loud-mouthed, opinionated Sean Penn playing a loud-mouthed opinionated former ambassador, Joe Wilson. Meanwhile, his wife, whose job requires her to have a bit more discretion, watches him stomp, make noise, and ultimately make enough noise to earn some enemies in high places. After a few initial fumbles (which we’ll discuss in a moment), a glaring pothole in the narrative left me shaking my head and almost irked enough to check out Plame’s book to find out if she treats the episode with similar off-handedness.

The scene in question is potentially the most dramatic – the moment when Penn/Wilson decides to send his column to the New York Times. In the film, Watts/Plame has just returned from a brutal day at the Agency. She comes in the door and when asked what is wrong, says that she really doesn’t want to talk about it. She heads upstairs and Penn/Wilson turns back to his desktop computer and begins composing the first line for his infamous New York Times Op-Ed… which led to the White House outing her as a CIA agent by leaking her identity in a bit of tit-for-tat “journalism” involving the reptilian Robert Novak. (At least Joe Wilson had the cojones to put his name to the article and offer it as an Op-Ed. Cheney had his leak ghostwritten by Novak.)

As movie moments go – this one smacks of egregious misstep if not its own outright cover-up.

Really? Plame just came home, went to bed, and Wilson never said anything before sending his article?! Or the following morning – like “By the way, honey, you know that trip to Africa I did for your employer? I’m going to write an editorial about it and see if I can get it published in… Oh, maybe the New York Times.”

Later, Penn/Wilson will have plenty of time to tearfully admit his publication of the article was a “selfish act” that had more to do with his own ego, and that Watts/Plame had maintained her silence to protect herself and her family. For me, the tremendous sacrifice Plame made before, and then after, publication is completely undercut by embracing Wilson’s position unambiguously; it is hardly so cut-and-dried as the redemptive encounter would have us believe. (What about the folks Plame worked with or the guy who sent Wilson on the mission – what happened to them?)

Just because Cheney’s White House acted reprehensibly doesn’t make Joe Wilson’s act any less problematic. Did he really not discuss it with his wife before publishing? (If not, this must have lead to some major meltdown when the newspaper arrived the next morning… Ummm, honey, did yoooooou publish an Op-Ed in the Times?) Watts/Plame is left seeming the victim of both.

And was there no discussion with the editorial staff of the NYTimes – Hey, look, fellas! We got some mail from a former ambassador on the issue of Yellow Cake, and the enrichment of uranium for a nuclear device which brings into question our reasons for promoting the idea of Weapons of Mass Destruction as a reason to go to war in Iraq… Think we should print it?

If Wilson and Plame DID discuss it, why not address it? Would an honest portrayal speak to issues Plame knew she was getting herself into? All of the rationalization and dramatic conflict that comes afterwards is brought into question by this glaring omission.

Yeah, yeah… it’s a Movie and maybe a single conflict over the course of one or two nights was used for dramatic effect later in the film – but that brings me to my 4 suggestions for Liberal “Message” movies:

1. Unless your subject’s dead, if you can’t tell the story the way it really happened, don’t make a biopic. Of course, this would force you to refer to Bob Johnson and Sally Smithers, a former ambassador and a CIA agent. But at least you won’t undermine your “truthful” story by scrambling the facts – which then leaves your critics (and in this case, a potential supporter) pointing out omissions. In this postmodern era, hagiography actually undermines any message you might be trying to make. Message or Living Hero: pick one.

2. Stop quoting Benjamin Franklin – or any other “Founding Father” for that matter! One particularly dreadful scene has Joe Wilson hectoring students with a quote from Ben Franklin about our need to defend Democracy…. Why gird your loins with the same historical flag-bedecked jockstrap Conservatives use? It makes you look as silly as they do. They want (desperately, childishly sometimes) to believe George Washington chopped down the cherry tree or stood in the boat all the way across the Potomac, because history for them is myth-making you use to foster your own agenda. They don’t use history to reflect upon past mistakes because this country never made any… U! S! A! They call upon these historical passages the same way true believers call upon any religious text – to damn enemies and put God on their side. Dancing in a circle and invoking “the Founding Fathers” – as if your case might magically be made more valid – is plain silly. I really don’t know what the hell Benjamin Franklin would have thought today; And you don’t either.

3. Speaking of invocations… Stop trying to captivate us with Bourne-Identity-drama. We’re adults. We can sit for a few minutes as you draw us into your characters rather than beat us over the head with them. The film opens with Watts/Plame showing us the life-and-death precariousness of undercover work but the bad-guy is SO clearly and comically bad and the good guy is, well, US – that it never allows the viewer to participate. The nuance that makes real drama, well, dramatic is completely missing. And sadly, Penn and Watts are such great actors that I found myself wanting more of the drama at the heart of their marital conflict and less of Scooter Libby as Golum. This movie could have been even more effective if it didn’t try so hard to demonize others but focused on personal shortcomings… which leads me to my final point….

4. Try a little real human conflict. I’m guessing that because the filmmakers felt many people didn’t know the details of this case they had to skip over interesting personal dynamics. Plame’s boss ends up shutting her down the same way every other turncoat agent in every other spy drama is left out in the cold. (To put it another way: did they ever have a relationship before he told her they didn’t? And if not, why is she surprised?) As for Penn/Wilson – if this man has as few friends and personal relationships as this movie seems to indicate perhaps its no wonder there was a bit of persecution complex. Wilson comes off as almost misanthropic, rather than the cocksure foreign service guy I imagine he really is. (The drama of the family trapped in Iraq was far more compelling but treated as a minor subplot.)

I know: other than that, what did you think of the play, Mrs. Lincoln? If you’ve gotten this far in my rant: thank you. I suppose at the heart of this entry is the disappointment that a film like this, with talent this good will simply play to kneejerk sympathizers and do little to enlighten those who might not have known about the case much less give those in the opposition pause (and cause) to consider a different point of view.

The films, Igor! The FILMS!!

One of the wonderful benefits of having a pass to Cannes is access to all the movies…. While a short film badge has its limitations, if you’re willing to pass on the red carpet stuff, many films are shown the next day at theaters around the Pavilion. (So, by the time we arrive Robin Hood which opened the festival is no longer circulating… but then again, it’s playing in town at the local theater.)

That said, being able to view film on the Pavilion screen, one of the largest screens I’ve every seen, is incredible – and the first film on the docket is a bit of neo-Italian Realism La Nostra Vita. It’s a quiet film in many ways and uses the now-ubiquitous-handheld-slightly-unsteady camera to give us a film full of close-ups and emotional reactions. The story is about a man who loses his wife and has to cope with both that loss and the economic realities in the housing market. In a strange way, it would be the perfect double bill for the film that closed out the Festival: The Tree where a woman faces the tragic death of her beloved husband and tries to cope with raising four children (as opposed to the La Nostra Vita’s three!)

The following day I saw Fair Game, the film about the Joe Wilson/Valerie Plame case. I’ll leave my liberal rant on that for later.

The Producer and I landed different tickets for films on the third day when Security Officers were swarming the place. Turns out the film she was seeing Outside the Law was the French film that was causing all the hubbub… a revisiting of the question of France’s occupation of Algeria in the 50’s and 60’s, a topic which still rankles here. No sooner had the Red Carpet and press conference ended than everybody packed up their plastic shields and bulletproof vests and went home.

My own ticket was for Loong Boonmee raleuk chat, by the Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul.

The title translates to: Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives. I think the name translates to: Maker of Oddly Beautiful Albeit Very Slow Movies.

It is a strange thing to be at a festival celebrating the diversity of film and watching people heading for the exits. Sure, these tuxedoes and sequined filmgoers probably had parties they could be at…. But with the director in attendance in the audience!, I was startled by the reaction to the film.

By the end of the film, my entire row in the balcony had cleared out.

The still I’ve posted above captures a bit of the eeriness of the film (though it’s not that eerie, more dreamlike). When this Sasquatch character is revealed later, the make-up job is so amateurish that many in the audience laughed; I'm still not sure if that was what the director intended. Perhaps he did.

And that is sort of at the heart of what I’m talking about with these movies…. If you just want to see what’s showing at your local Cineplex, why bother sitting here? Aren’t these supposed to be cinema aspiring to something greater?

The opening five minutes of the film features a farmer looking for a large ox that has gotten away into the deep forest…. I’m not sure but this may be a reference to an old Buddhist text that likens the taming of the mind with oxherding, I also could be completely wet on that idea. The film is a strange collection of images of a man at the end of his life, suffering from a kidney disease, visited by his dead wife’s ghost and taking a journey to a cave filled with lights glittering like stars.... There is no real explaining the story of the Princess who is ravished by a catfish... save for those who might know Thai mythology. Let's just say: intense.

And that is precisely the point: how much of any film must map to our immediate understanding? Aren't films -- like books -- sometimes improved with revisiting? (Nabokov claimed you had to read a book at least twice to truly "read" it... that your first experience was simply getting to know the countryside. (My metaphor, not his certainly.))

One of the reasons I love going back to Fellini or Tarkovsky or Lynch or Tarantino is that you find something you missed. Heck, I feel that way about the Wizard of Oz sometimes which is what makes it a great movie in my book. In this case, I know I missed a great deal but I have a hankering to know more and isn't that what it's like when you meet a good friend? You want to know a little more.

[Postscript: as you may have heard/read Uncle Boonmee won the Palme D'Or. It was a bit of a surprise to me --but with Tim Burton leading the jury I think everyone thought a dreamlike film might gain some greater attention -- and respect.]

When the Producer Leaves: the Sequel

For the record: Sabine is cute, bunny rabbit cute. C’est tu. When she first approaches me, the brief giggle that precedes everything she says and her permanent smile are so guileless even her braces look cute. Sabine is the one on the far left. (We’re talking Dora the Explorer, not Lolita, dear reader.)

Turns out that she and her friend (next to Sabine) have managed to cadge a ticket. BUT according to the rules, they need someone with an exhibition badge to accompany them in. When I shrug and say “Sure” she gives a little bunny hop and looks at her friend who is negotiating the older couple next to us to be her chaperone. The older, wiser woman assures them that no one checks badges but clearly they’ve heard different.

Because the woman’s husband has the coveted BLUE ticket which apparently allows access without a badge along with a companion, there is a general swapping of tickets which thrills the two teens. Sabine breaks out her iPhone and starts texting.

In minutes we’re joined by Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail. Suddenly I am Beatrix Freakin’ Potter.

I pray that Robert Pattinson/Patterson/whatever-the-Twilight-vampire’s-name-is doesn’t put in an appearance or I might get trampled.

When I offer to take their photograph, they hop together. Each slips into a pose as I juggle digital cameras of every shape and size because each one has to have a photo.

The blue badge variable means I will now chaperone Celeste (the one on the far right). In spite of what the older woman has told us, they do indeed check the badges and briefly Celeste panics until I assure the guard she is with me. She’s still wide-eyed when we all step onto the red carpet area and watch the celebrities from the awards ceremony file out past us.

When I offer to get a picture of them on the red carpet, much to the annoyance of the guards hurrying people up the stairs, I earn five friends for life. I return their cameras and then head into the pavilion leaving the girls to hop to their own seats and enjoy the Pavilion with the same unabashed excitement and sheer glee we older, suited sorts should probably be showing.

Why am I here? Part II

Oh, yes... and there's this too.

My Last Salad (Or: What Happens When the Producer Leaves)

On the last day of the Festival, the Producer headed back to the U.S. I scored a ticket to the Closing Film.

It was the first dinner in Cannes by myself. I found a café just two blocks from the buzz of the Pavilion. (Keep in mind, the Producer has been gone from town all of three hours….)

I was still standing, removing my jacket, at the outdoor café, when a young woman dressed in a grey t-shirt and cut-off jeans that were darkened by the damp bikini underneath stopped as she was walking past and said:

“Are-- are you going to the closing night party?”
“No, just the last film at 11 o’clock.”
“Oh! You are! Well, could I ask-- could I go with you? I’ve been here in Cannes and not really attended any of the events. I would like… I would like to go with you.”
We stared at each other for a moment. “Sorry. I just have the one ticket.” I waved the ticket like a surrender flag, not sure why I was apologizing.
She smiled. “Okay! Can’t hurt to ask.” And she was off.

I took my seat wondering how many men and women had passes for parties that evening that would give a whole new meaning to the term Access.

After taking my seat, no sooner had I ordered a meal when a police van pulled up to the corner forty feet from me. Two officers jumped out and began shutting down the narrow one way streets going north and south from the beach.

We were just two blocks from Palais and the Awards Ceremony were underway so I imagined this was to allow some dignitary to enter with a motorcycle cortege. Or perhaps leave early.

The wait staff seemed fairly interested and the couple next to me kept glancing up the street.

The waiter brought my salad and when he said something with clearly a bit of a chuckle in his voice, the couple next to me began laughing. I asked the couple if they spoke English. The blonde guy nodded and said he did. He translated.

“The waiter said: ‘Enjoy your salad; it may be your last.’ The police are up the street investigating a bomb in that car.” He pointed to a car that we could all see from our vantage in the café.

We sat there watching a few more police arrive. I began assessing the street, noticing a six story construction crane where the car was parked – which, if hit by a blast would fall… Well, heck, it’d fall directly on us! Everyone moved as if more annoyed or puzzled by the potential bomb than frightened of it.

I had just finished the salad when one of the policemen came back down the street and began waving everyone to get around the corner. My neighbor explained that they had found a device and were bringing in a robot to remove it. I got up and joined the others from the restaurant down the intersecting side street. (At one point, a wild haired young man in a suitcoat and jeans and credentialed badge from the Festival came up and asked me what was going on. When I told him the police were investigating a bomb, his eyes brightened and he began walking towards the scene. I don’t know if he had a camera and was trying to get some story, but interestingly, after one verbal warning, the policeman clapped a firm hand on his shoulder and began to drag him backwards and threw him at us.)

After the “device” had been cleared, we took our seats again and within 10 minutes everything had resumed to “normal” – with quotes around it because clearly normal has the capacity to become highly "abnormal" fast.

The next day, I did a Google new search for any mention of Cannes or bomb but only found references to the French film on Algeria which had brought security guards out in great numbers on Friday. Other than that: nothing.

I was – and still am – struck by the relative nonchalance of everyone including the couple next to me and the police. It was though apparently not my last salad.

What am I doing here?

At one in the morning – Thursday moving into Friday – I am walking the Croisette the sidewalk that runs along the beach and provides access to all the private parties happening under tents that belch light and dance music.

“Hugh!” I hear someone call. It is not always the case that the “You…” someone is shouting to someone else ends up being me – but in this case, I look up and see Patrice, a Frenchman living in Ireland. I had met him at a film festival one year ago. He’s dressed in a tux as well and introduces me to a Irish filmmaker he is working with.

It’s hard to describe the unsettling feeling of being far away from home and hearing someone call out to you. We've all felt it but as much as it is reassuring there's always something unsettling of seeing a familiar face in a very unfamiliar place. (The strangest was a brief side-trip I took to Berlin on a business trip to see partial eclipse of the sun. After sitting through that eerily unsettling event in the shadow of the city’s gold angel at the Victory Column. As the sun returned and sky brightened again, I was walking to the Brandenburg Gate when someone called out my name. I was so disoriented by it I completely spaced the woman’s name for the next five minutes….)

Granted I should not be completely surprised, Patrice and I had exchanged a few emails in the year since we first met and I knew he was coming to Cannes. But he had originally planned on coming for just the first few days…. He was, he told me with a broad grin, extending his stay because he had “met some very interesting people.”

In some ways, Patrice is more than a sight for sore eyes in a city of unfamiliar faces, but a validation of why I am here making further connections. A bit too slowly and incrementally it seems but to quote a line from a short film by a Hungarian filmmaker I had met just that afternoon: “Usually what we long for is right outside our comfort zone.”

Stacey the Producer and I had spent the morning and early afternoon preparing 15 packets for short film buyers who work for European distributors. Patrice, who is here trying to find companies interested in investing in a Irish film which Martin Sheen is said to be attached to, tells me that a Russian distributor has been showing an interest in shorts from the U.S. and Western Europe. He quotes a price per minute on what the standard rate for a short is and I frown a bit in disbelief. “Really?”

“Yes, yes! You should talk to them.” And then he is off to another party. Patrice is a hummingbird, hovering a bit to savor the conversation, then moving quickly on. Blink and he's gone.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t here to enjoy a first glimpse of amazing films from around the world, to experience the Pavilion red carpet, or find myself walking up the gangplank to a yacht docked in the bay (more on that later). But getting more people to see “Credits” with the outside chance of finding someone interested in the feature script I’ve got in my suitcase or any other mutually beneficial working relationship is why I am here.

Strangely though, the random conversation you strike up in a café, an elevator or a hotel lobby can be just as effective and fruitful as the carefully calculated campaign of meetings and personally written notes to a list of buyers.

The Cannes Collection: A Further Taxonomy

Continuing our series on the Creatures of Cannes, let’s turn our attention to the behavior known as Gawking. Here, you are encouraged – one might even say – incited to Gawk.

Exhibit #1: Female Firefly


This aging beauty was first spotted with a young woman in tow who had been hired (I kid you not) to carry the bustle of her gown as they hurried to a reception. (That was the first attention-getter.) I might have given this no more notice save for the moment when someone shouted: “Her dress has lights on it!”

And indeed, she/it did. The only thing that could make this scene a little more classy? A cigarette! No sooner had she begun to draw a crowd, she beckoned for a cigarette and for a minute or so – until the gasper was lit – it flapped impotently in her mouth as she continued to talk to her admirers.





Exhibit #2: Runway Confection


At each of the evening events, you see young women who have been dolled up in what some might called “haute couture” and others might call “not couture”. They are usually skimpy affairs (the dresses and the women) with real flowers, fake cotton candy, fishing tackle and miscellaneous other items strategically placed to avoid arrest. In this particular case, coming down the stairway in the Palais after midnight, this woman in what appeared to be a lime green outfit from the Jetsons posed for gawkers like me who were armed with digital cameras.

I’m guessing the point is that some women are expected to ask – “And just who IS the designer of that dress?” I’m just not sure WHO would ask that question of this particular dress.

Art, Commerce and that Guy from Australia

“There are festivals and there are film market events,” the grey-bearded producer in a white linen jacket with blue pinstripes informs me, “but this is the best combination of both.”

He should know (he tells me) he’s been doing this for 30 years. It’s a pleasure talking to this guy as we wait in line for the screening of Fair Game. He sums up how Cannes has changed in 30 years with one word: Drugs. “Before,” he says, “the African man on the corner selling umbrellas was also selling Moroccan hash. Not so much of that anymore – though you can still find it if you’re looking for it.” He adds this last bit as if to reassure me.

He’s carrying a laptop with a trailer or rough cut of a mockumentary about a rock star who fell out of the public eye due to drug use and is making a comeback that a friend of his who is trying to make his own comeback is making. (It didn’t sound quite so meta- as it does writing it.) I couldn’t bring myself to ask him: hasn’t that been done a couple of Spinal Taps back?

Later, I look him up on IMDB and sure enough – a man by that name has indeed been producing for the last 30 years. But whether he gave Naomi Watts her first big break in Australia (the reason, he tells me, he is interested in this film) that information is a bit more sketchy. I see no production in which both of their names are mentioned.

But I’m intrigued to hear stories from Festival Veterans like this – they’re one of several different species that flock to the coast of the Mediterranean this time of year….

Just minutes before, I had been sitting in the American Pavilion where one of the young film student volunteers stood directly behind me – and rather than wander the table getting orders (which his companion was doing with Olympian earnestness “Can I help you? Anything? Anything?”) – he played air drums: CH-ccch-ccch-TCCH!-ccch-ccch-TCCCH! His hands moved in a steady rhythm whether he was nailing an air highhat or an air snare. He called everyone he met, regardless of race or gender, “dude” with a frequency that would embarrass Sean Penn’s Spiccolli (though I did notice when an African-American volunteer approached him it was: “‘ssup, dude? What are you DOING?!!!” He asked this question as if the man was about to set someone’s hair on fire. “I’m just putting the menus on the table,” the guy said as if to calm his eager co-worker down.)

But one particular behavior sets our Drumming Dude apart, a behavior you see among others of his sub-species Juvenis Clueless (which should be noted as different from Juvenis Genius of which there are a couple floating around in sunglasses and dark clothes)… and that behavior is: Indiscriminate Fawning.

Let’s listen in and watch this behavior in action, shall we?....

A co-worker has informed Drumming Dude that several other volunteers have begun setting up for the upcoming Short Film roundtable [NOTE: Editors have not supplemented any ‘dudes’ for this verbatim conversation:]

“So, dude, who’s in the roundtable anyway?”
“James Franco and three other filmmakers.”
“James Franco. Dude, who’s James Franco?”
“He was in the Spiderman One and Two, Pineapple Express, Milk….”
“Really? Oh. Oh, dude – can I help out with any tech?”
“We’re pretty well covered.”
“Camera? Who’s shooting this? Dude, do you think I could talk them in to switching?.”
“No. We’re all set.”
“But who-- who’s doing the camera? Audio? Maybe I could talk to them?”
“Really. We’re all set.”
“Oh, dude – I’d really like to hear James Franco.”

From complete ignorance of the very name James Franco to earnest fan in 10 lines of dialog. You have to kind of admire the single-mindedness.

Of course, seated in the American Pavilion and reporting all of this dialog is your very own correspondent: of the species known as aging, bespectacled Midwest-tern, known throughout the world for its stereotyping and snap judgments.

Art, Commerce and the Dream Market

Quirky pigheadedness or delusional optimism?

As I walk through the Marche, the film market/tradeshow area of Cannes, those are the only two reasons I can come up with for why I went ahead and made a second short film. When you see the sheer number of higher budget films that will never make it to a Cineplex near you, you not only have a greater appreciation for what it takes to get a film to that Cineplex, but you stare slackjawed at the odds against one of your own films ever making it.

I admire every one of these gutsy bastards trying to break through the noise in the same way I admire every novelist and poet who keeps on writing knowing that bookstores are disappearing and access is going to be mediated (for better or worse) through social media in the near future.

Here it’s like a moshpit at an Art and Commerce concert; everything is a blur: arms, legs, heads. So it’s hard sometimes to see which of these films might be an earnest attempt to tell a story in a visually and aurally fascinating way and which is just a machine for making big bucks. It’s especially hard to tell from the Synopses on the posters and postcards, such as:

Victorio, a movie from Mexico, in which “A reckless Mara gang member and a beauty who knows no fear look into each other’s eyes and fall in love forever.” Heck, now I’m just have to see that “look”.

My favorite title: Dancing Ninja. A musical? I’m imagining a cross between Enter the Dragon and Flashdance.

And at the risk of seeming culturally insensitive, I also get a chuckle out of descriptions like this one for the next big Bollywood blockbuster, Housefull:

‘Housefull’ is a romantic comedy entertainer which is the story of Aarush – the world’s unluckiest man. Being jinxed, he believes his bad luck can vanish if he finds true love. In this quest for true love one lie leads to another and different people from different walks of life come together adding even more confusion to this hilarious comedy of errors resulting in total chaos and mayhem. As Deepika tells Akshay in the film: ‘Jis jhooth se kissi ka ghar basta ho, voh jhooth nahin hota.’

Hard to argue with Deepika on that.

I especially liked the description of a Iranian film that is being marketed in that country's large film booth at the Marche: Two blind men decided to rub (sic) a jewelry shop. A policeman loves a saleswoman in their office and his subordinate loves a movie star. Two killers are to be evolved and become nice guys. A young man, who wants to commit suicide, causes some problems. A disappointed sculptor wishes to immigrate. However, everyone’s destiny is changed when a strange fish is freed and a charming ring is moved.

Sounds like the perfect film to come from the land of Shahnemah and the Arabian Nights.

But my award for the most unabashedly honest description has to be the Russian film called Pokhoronite Menya Za Plintusom which apparently translates to Bury Me Behind the Baseboard. Now, if you’re thinking this sounds like a rather depressing film in an otherwise rollicking canon of Russian cinema’s of romantic comedies, wait until you read the synopsis:

Sergei Snezhin’s film “Bury Me Behind the Baseboard” shows us 3 days from the life of eight-year boyy Sasha Savelyev. He lives with his grandparents, he is very sickly, and goes to school less often than to the doctor. The grandmother stuffs the boy with medicines, health food, and morals….

[Hang on, this may be looking up….]

And Sasha has only one dream – to meet his mum at least on his birthday.

[Surely his dream will come true, no? No?….]

The film reveals the suffocative atmosphere of the rough 80s in the USSR, the real face of Russian intellectuals. The movies is so sincere that makes afraid of its closeness to the reality of the Soviet people’s everyday life – terribly sad, hopeless, and infinitely gloomy.

[And yes, there’s more…]

The Granny (Svetlana Kryuchkova) is represented so vividly that you really hate her at the beginning and empathize with her at the end.

What I love about this “marketing” is that it’s so unabashedly honest. From the title on down there’s no attempt to woe, much less seduce you with “a heartwarming fable” or “a touching family drama”.

I wonder if Pokhoronite Menya Za Plintusom will ever make it to the U.S. (not make it in the U.S., because we all know it could never do that!)

I’ve always loved the French word for “dream”: rêve. Dreams – from the comically absurd to nightmares – are what these films are all about. Some have at their heart a longing to reshape or redeem reality; some want to present a view of the world you have never seen… what they share in common is the human urge to connect, to present something we might share… whether a moment of frightened tension and release or, like Sasha, some deep longing which (if I’m reading the synopsis right) is illuminated by grace.

Now, if you’ll excuse me… I’m off to enter an Italian dream of neo-realism.

An Opening Rant

In Hollywood, they say that sequels often do better box office than the original. I have hopes for this second trip to Cannes… but then again, this isn’t Hollywood. And “Credits” is a different kind of short film from “Arc of a Bird.”

I’m also doing this trip at the tail end of the festival when many folks have already left. Work commitments kept me from coming any earlier and my rationale was that perhaps with a little less of the initial noise in the opening crush, I might be able to have better connections with people.

Before I launch into my first day’s take on the Festival, I’m going to risk an “Ugly American” entry with a topic that’s bugged me for years on trips to France: the soundtrack.

Twenty minutes is not an awfully long time to sit on a shuttle bus from the Nice Airport to Cannes, but it becomes an eternity when you’re listening to 80’s American pop music. While I can sit through Tina Turner woe-oh-oh-ohing her way through the mind-numbing brain teaser “What’s Love Got To Do (Got to Do) With It?” I am absolutely clueless as to why Rockwell’s “Somebody’s Watching Me” got picked up by a French radio station in 2010.

“Sacre-bleu, Philippe, do you realize vee have not played ze ode to paranoia done by that son of a Gordy Barry in years!” It’s as if the radio signals that go out into the vast reaches of deep space entered a black hole and circled back around to attack us once again.

“I always feel like… somebody’s WATCH-ing me-eee/Tell me: is it fantasy?”

I have a couple theories: a) the French Tourism Bureau has a mandatory policy that 70s disco and 80s pop MUST be played for American tourists to sort of pander to them (believing perhaps that we’ll tip better when dipped in our own pop goo); or b) it’s a well-organized plot – with transit workers, hotels and taxi drivers involved – to drive us nuts when we’re on French soil. Half an hour after landing you find a pop refrain bouncing around your brain that you won’t be able to shake out for the next several days. “Hunh-hunh, monsieur – you might have thought you could escape Toni the Basil singing ‘Mickey!’ but you cannot escape from ze Rockwell.”

“When I’m in the shower/I’m afraid to wash my hair/’Cause I might open my eyes/And find someone standing there.” Honest to God: those are the lyrics.

Part of me thinks: “Okay. Queen’s ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ might be an interesting piece of cultural driftwood we could keep on a shelf in our collective cultural den.” but Rockwell? Really? As I write this I am hearing Michael Jackson’s background vocals and I know I’ll be hearing it for days.

After twenty minutes of Tina, Queen, Duran Duran, and just for good measure, Kim Carnes singing ‘Betty Davis Eyes’… followed by the ultimate indignity of Rockwell – you want to yell: “For God’s sake! You’ve had great soundtrack composers… What happened? Think about the best from a George Delerue or even Vangelis (okay, I know he’s Greek but he hung out here)! Punk drove disco music out of the U.S. thirty years ago and it’s wound up here like some destitute relative phoning you constantly. How can you people live with this stuff?! I know we started it but….”

And then you step off the shuttle bus in Cannes and see the tall young woman in an impossibly short Canary yellow dress sitting at the outdoor café sipping an espresso and think: I’m sorry. What were we just talking about?