Cannes at Home: Days 9 & 10 – Champions of Festivals Past

by Cláudio Alves

Just as the favorites for the Palme d'Or seemed to have settled, here comes another barrage of rave reviews to muddy the waters. Not only is it impossible to predict what Östlund's jury will choose, but it seems like, every day, the critics elect a new title to champion. On the ninth day of the festivities, Trần Anh Hùng's Pot-au-Feu dazzled many with its gastronomic love affair, making comparisons to Babette's Feast. Then came Nanni Moretti's A Brighter Tomorrow, less acclaimed but blessed by enthusiast defenders. On the 10th day of Cannes, it was time for Wim Wenders' Perfect Days to ignite Best Actor speculation, while Catherine Breillat's Queen of Hearts remake became another instant frontrunner for the big prize. Will Last Summer take the Palme? 

For the Cannes at Home series, the focus shall be on these auteurs' past festival successes. The Scent of Green Papaya earned Hùng the Camera d'Or and Vietnam its only Oscar nomination. Moretti won the Best Director prize at Cannes '93 with Caro Diario, and Wim Wenders was the Palme victor of '84 with Paris, Texas. Finally, there's Breillat's hyper-controversial Fat Girl, a prizewinner from the 51st Berlinale…

Click to read more ...

Palme d'Or Champions: En francais, s'il vous plaît

by Cláudio Alves

Apologies for my absence in the past few weeks, dear readers. Two back-to-back festival makes up a daunting task, when it involves over fifty write-ups. Anyway, eager to jump back into The Film Experience. To ease the way a curious trifle. As I was browsing through Twitter, I came across a curious conundrum in the form of a new French poster for this year's Palme d'Or winner, and the title splashed across its badly Photoshopped self. While Ruben Östlund's latest is called Triangle of Sadness or a direct translation in nearly every territory, those French distributors had another idea. In the land where it won the Croisette's highest honor, the film is known as Sans Filtre…

Click to read more ...

Cannes at Home: Day 5 – A Tale of Two Victors

by Cláudio Alves

The fourth day of Main Competition screenings saw the premiere of two films by former Palme d'Or winners. First up, Swedish auteur Ruben Östlund returned to the Croisette after taking the festival's top honor with The Square. Triangle of Sadness is the director's first film since then, perchance indicating a newfound obsession with geometrical titling. Reactions have skewed positive, though there are dissenting voices. Then, it was time for Cristian Mungiu to present R.M.N, this year's first major Palme contender as far as critical reception is concerned (Elisa's review). It should be noted that this is the fourth time Mungiu has presented a film in the Main Competition – all three previous projects won prizes, setting a good precedent for the Romanian master. 

Logically, when discussing these laurelled artists, the mind drifts to their victorious flicks. Today's Cannes at Home selections are The Square and 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days…

Click to read more ...

Cannes Closing Ceremony (Arrivals) *Live Blog*

by Nathaniel R

LIVE CEREMONY

6:26 Most of the people we're seeing on the red carpet are people from the 2020 Cannes that was cancelled. It's a nice tribute to invite all of them. They wave before the 2021 stars begin crowding the carpet... 

Click to read more ...

Cannes at Home: The Best Palme d'Or Winners Ever!

by Cláudio Alves

It's time to end the Cannes at Home project. Hopefully, these daily posts haven't been a bore. For me, as a writer and film lover, they've been a blast, a sparkling antidote to Cannes-induced FOMO. Thank you so much for reading along. Finally, to end on something special, I decided to rank all Palme d'Or winners from 1949 to 2019, eighty winners in all. For brevity's sake and because it's my birthday and I don't want to dwell on negativity, this write-up is only focused on the top ten, my absolute favorites of the bunch. If you're interested, the complete ranking's on my Letterboxd or you can read an old version of it on the Portuguese website Magazine.HD. And now, without further ado, here are my choices for the best Palme d'Or winners of all time…

Click to read more ...