Cannes Diary: Guy Maddin's "Rumors" and Jia Zhangke's "Caught by the Tides"

by Elisa Giudici

Cannes is over but we continue with a few more reviews! Here are my takes on two disappointing new features from famous auteurs.

RUMORS by Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson
The G7 leaders gather for their annual meeting, but a mysterious fog envelops the garden where they are dining, leaving them alone with strange creatures inhabiting the surrounding forest. They must navigate the forest in search of answers while drafting the resolution of a meeting that never truly began...

Maddin and Johnson's cinema lives and dies by one problem: they excel at short to medium-length films, but they struggle with longer runtimes. The first half-hour of Rumors is brilliant, starting with a lightning-fast pace. However, the idea soon reveals itself to be too narrow and underdeveloped to sustain an entire film, which begins to lose its spark, repeat itself, unravel, and lose intensity. Not even a memorable Cate Blanchett, sporting a salmon pink jacket and an Angela Merkel-style bouffant, can save the film.

The gags about the romantic entanglements between the leaders, combined with music and visual elements reminiscent of soap operas (as in May December), become tiresome over time. However, I can't help but appreciate the desperation to include Charles Dance in their project as the President of the United States. A sharp joke midway through the film addresses and immediately dismisses the elephant in the room—his unmistakably British accent.

CAUGHT BY THE TIDES by Jia Zhangke
I'm not a huge fan of Jia Zhangke and his narrative universe tied to the Three Gorges Dam. Nevertheless, I'm fairly certain I can categorize Caught By The Tides as a minor entry in this thematic horizon. I screened the film sandwiched between two fervent fans of the famed director, and by the end, they were more disappointed than I was.

The film does have memorable moments, portrayed in Zhangke's typical style of gathering scenes, images, and wordless moments "where nothing happens," mirroring the way nothing often happens in life. His cinema is one of accumulation, of infinitesimal moments that add up until they produce a powerful emotion. That's  true here again given the particularly cruel setting for the banality and ugliness of the reunion.

Still, many aspects of the film do not prove effective. There's also a portion set during the COVID pandemic, a topic that remains somewhat unsettling to see on the big screen.

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