· Jane Campion's Oscar-probable Bright Star, which sold before the festival began and had a release date (Sept. 18) by the time today's press screening was out, has found a few fans in Cannes. Chief among them is likely Peter Bradshaw, writing in the Guardian: "Campion has put herself in line for her second Palme d'Or here at the Cannes film festival with a film which I think could be the best of her career." Eric Kohn led the vocal minority at indieWIRE: "This might sound horribly simplistic, but Jane Campion's Bright Star desperately needs a sex scene." Campion doesn't seem to care much either way, just as long as you don't call her John Keats/Fanny Brawne romance a "biopic." Got it?
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Along with our own man Dave Bourgeois, Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeffrey Wells has been promenading around the Croisette, taking in the sights, sounds, and obscure, decrepit French stars of the Cannes Film Festival. Today, Wells stumbled upon a bus shelter ad of a handsome man, which he captioned, "It took me a few seconds to realize who this is. Taken in Cannes either 28 or 30 years ago, I'm guessing. If I say for which films I'll be giving it away."
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On a gloomy Friday in Cannes — where a torrential downpour aggravated and frustrated the hurried journalists dashing to the 8:30 a.m. press screening of Jane Campion's Bright Star — the stars of Lee Daniel's Sundance winner Precious hit the Plage VitaminWater on the Croisette for a luncheon and press conference. It was revealing in more ways than one.
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Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus doesn't screen at the Cannes Film Festival until a week from tomorrow, but he's staying plenty busy on the Croisette. After announcing he'll soon return to his infamously cursed The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (with or without his original star Johnny Depp), he's not wasting any time selling Parnassus to both buyers and -- he hopes -- Academy voters who took so kindly to Heath Ledger's previous performance.
Wait a second: Terry Gilliam? Courting a posthumous Oscar for Heath Ledger? Since when?
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· A smattering of critics have had a look at Francis Ford Coppola's Tetro, which officially opens Cannes' Directors Fortnight sidebar today. And so far, the praise is polite at best: "Although it feels at times like a vanity project, some strong performances [...] save all but Tetro's most cringeworthy lines," reports Screen Daily. Todd McCarthy was less sanguine at Variety: "The angst-ridden treatment of Oedipal issues makes the picture play out like a passably talented imitation of O'Neill, Williams, Miller and Inge, and thus it feels like the pale product of an over-tilled field." But, he adds, watch for big things from young star Alden Ehrenreich.
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Amidst hazy and humid weather, the 62nd Cannes Film Festival officially opened today with a black-tie, evening screening of the Disney/Pixar film Up, directed by Peter Docter. Both pomp and circumstance were in high demand as thousands of cheering French people welcomed a gaggle of (mainly French) celebrities who vamped on the red carpet — perhaps this festival is the only time the black-tie-wearing paparazzi ever shout "Agnès" in trying to get racy snapshots of French director Agnès Varda.
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After all that debate about their visibility and reach, Sony Pictures Classics made a pretty conspicuous pair of purchases this afternoon at Cannes: Michael Haneke's WWI-era mystery The White Ribbon and the lush, closing-night biopic Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky.
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We're thrilled to introduce you to a new member of the Movieline family: David Bourgeois has spent the last 24 hours with his knees hiked up to his forehead in Air France Rat classe, that he might bring you just a taste of the Cannes International Film Festival experience straight from the topless beaches and thumping discotheques of the French Riviera.
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After much ado and some big Weinsteinian talk, the Cannes Film Festival finally opens in a few hours with the world premiere of Up. But healthy helpings of advance talk continue, from early acquisitions to more Heath Ledger sightings (online, anyway). Find today's sampling after the jump.
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Get! Excited! The 62nd Cannes Film Festival launches Wednesday, and the news doesn't stop just because of a lack of stateside swagger on the Croisette. After all, Harvey Weinstein is readying his circus acts, the Chinese may spark an international incident, and we have the wildly bipolar collision of economics and tradition to keep an eye on as the fest rolls through May 24. Movieline will have a correspondent on the ground, but for now, we go to the advance team:
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In a conciliatory gesture aimed at making amends for a controversy that saw its former director stepping down amid rumors he had contributed to an anti-gay-marriage initiative, the Los Angeles Film Festival offered up the impossibly dreamy-eyed same-sex union of Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna for their lineup announcement at a Westwood hotel this morning. Their involvement relates to the 2009 LAFF's spotlight on their Ambulante Film Festival, an itinerant documentary series that brings stories by and about Mexican cultures to areas that might otherwise never have access to them.
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It feels like a lifetime ago that everywhere my colleagues and I turned, some new collision of politics and pop culture exploded in or around Hollywood. In reality, of course, it all happened just last year, and we weren't the only ones paying attention: In Movieline's final visit to the Tribeca Film Festival, we found Oscar-winner turned born-again indie helmer Barry Levinson unveiling his own record of that time, Poliwood.
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By the time Cheryl Hines returned to the Tribeca Film Festival on Friday, the worst of the jitters were behind her. But for a while there, the Curb Your Enthusiasm star and first-time filmmaker confessed, she couldn't be too sure. "I thought I was going to pass out," Hines told Movieline on her way back to the fest, where less than a week before, her feature directorial debut Serious Moonlight premiered to a warm, sold-out reception.
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Duncan Jones's feature directorial debut Moon passed muster at Sundance '09 and received high marks as the inaugural film to face Movieline's Two-Minute Verdict. But when David Bowie showed up to last night's packed Tribeca premiere, one could hear the distinct thud of a gauntlet thrown down on the red carpet. After all, what would Ziggy Stardust make of this young director's vision of space, isolation and lunar dwelling? It was anyone's guess, though Jones appeared to hold a trump card: He's Bowie's son.
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The Tribeca Film Festival handed out its hardware Thursday night, awarding the year's top prizes to an Oscar-nominated doc maker, an Iranian auteur, and new It-girl Zoe Kazan among many others.
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