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Xavier Giannoli hat die sehenswerte True-Crime-Serie „Of Money and Blood“ über einen Jahrhundertbetrug gemacht, die jetzt auf Magenta TV gestartet ist. Der profilierte Regisseur und Dauergast in Cannes spricht darüber, warum dieser Stoff sein allererstes Serienprojekt wurde.

Xavier Giannoli (l.) und seine Serie „Of Money and Blood“

Der profilierte französische Filmemacher Xavier Giannoli hat mit „Of Money and Blood“ seine erste Serie gedreht. Eine unterhaltsame, episch in zwölf Episoden erzählte Crime-Serie über den „Betrug des Jahrhunderts“, wie ihn französische Journalisten bezeichneten: einen milliardenschweren Kohlendioxidsteuerbetrug nach dem Sachbuch des Journalisten Fabrice Arfi. In den Hauptrollen spielen unter anderen Vincent Lindon, Niels Schneider und Ramzy Bedia. Die unterhaltsame Serie ist jetzt in Deutschland auf Magenta TV zu sehen.

„Of Money and Blood“ war Ihr allererstes Serienprojekt. Wie war die Erfahrung für Sie als Kinofilm-Regisseur?

Xavier Giannoli: Ich habe die Erfahrung geliebt, eine Serie mit zwölf Episoden zu drehen, weil man so die Zeit hat,...

Pan-European indie group Vuelta, which recently bought Telepool in Germany, has completed another strategic acquisition with WW Entertainment, one of Benelux’s largest distributors.

With offices in Amsterdam and in Belgium, WW Entertainment (previously eOne Entertainment Benelux) has consolidated a solid portfolio of local and international titles in the last decade. WW Entertainment’s recent hits include “Loverboy: Emoties Uit,” as well as “Hit Man” and “Bombini Bangkok Nights.”

The acquisition of WW Entertainment gives Vuelta a solid footprint in Benelux, a key European market for theatrical distribution, spreading from Belgium to the Netherlands.

The deal also fits into Vuelta’s strategy to build synergies with some of its other European distribution banners, including Scanbox in Scandinavia, SquareOne/Telepoolin Germany and Pan in France. The latter just scored big in France with the local dramedy “A Little Something Extra” which outperformed Hollywood blockbusters tops this year’s French box office,...

Ever since its predecessor in 2003, the Luther franchise has been a popular and well-respected storyline. In 2023, Idris Elba made his second appearance as John Luther, the incredible detective who has been locked behind bars, partly continuing the storyline of the television series titled ‘Luther’. In ‘Luther: The Fallen Sun’, John Luther must make his escape from prison to continue the pursuit of his nemesis - a diabolical serial killer - and prove himself worthy of being called a detective. Idris Elba stars alongside Cynthia Erivo, Andy Serkis, Dermot Crowley, Thomas Coombes, Hattie Morgan, Lauryn Ajufo, and Vincent Regan. Related article: Evolution: Every Ryan Gosling Role From 1995 to 2020, All Performances Exceptionally Poignant Related article: Evolution: Every Henry Cavill Role From 2001 to 2021, All Performances Exceptionally Poignant Related article: All Best Actor/Actress Speeches From The Beginning Of Oscars 1929-2019 | Hollywood Insider Related article: The 2022 NAACP Image Awards: Full List of Nominees, A History of the Ceremony,...

Nominations voting is from January 8-12, 2025, with official Oscar nominations announced January 17, 2025. Final voting is February 11-18, 2025. And finally, the 97th Oscars telecast will be broadcast on Sunday, March 2 and air live on ABC at 7:00 p.m. Et/ 4:00 p.m. Pt. We update our picks through awards season, so keep checking IndieWire for all our 2025 Oscar predictions.

The State of the Race

While Netflix doesn’t have the best track record with getting actors an Oscar, it does have an amazing track record at getting its stars a nomination. “Roma” star Yalitza Aparicio, “Blonde” star Ana de Armas, and even “Nyad” star Annette Bening to an extent are examples of performances that were not considered shoo-ins on nomination day, yet they happened.

So ultimately, the streaming service’s move to acquire Angelina Jolie vehicle “Maria” — even though it already has a strong, potential history-making contender in “Emilia Pérez...

We can start our week extending thanks to Arte France Cinéma, who’ve given two of France’s greatest directors the cash flow to support immediate endeavors: per Cineuropa, Claire Denis and Arnaud Desplechin can soon begin production on new features. The former’s is Le Cri des Gardes (The Cry of the Guards), which sounds an awful lot like The Fence, a project she detailed in March. Matt Dillon, Riley Keough, and Denis mainstay Isaach de Bankolé will star in the feature, described in these very Denis-like terms:

“As project supervisor Horn is welcoming his young partner Léone into the hut he shares with young and impetuous engineer Cal, a black man called Alboury appears outside the railings surrounding their quarters. Inflexible, hovering like a ghost in the darkness, he is determined to stay there until they return the body of his brother to him, who was killed on the site.

Das Chicago International Film Festival feiert dieses Jahr 60. Jubiläum. In den Internationalen Wettbewerb wurden u.a. Pia Marais‘ „Transamazonia“ und Mohammad Rasoulofs „Die Saat des heiligen Feigenbaums“ eingeladen. „Der Spatz im Kamin“ von Ramon Zürcher feiert seine US-Premiere, The Match Factory hat gleich drei Koproduktionen dort. Aus Österreich sind „Pfau“ und „The Village Next to Paradise“ im Debüt-Wettbewerb vertreten.

„Der Spatz im Kamin” (Credit: Zürcher Film)

Sowohl „Transamazonia“ von Pia Marais (hier unsere Spot-Besprechung) als auch „Der Spatz im Kamin“ von Ramon Zürcher (hier unsere Spot-Besprechung) feierten ihre Weltpremiere im Wettbewerb von Locarno. Beide Filme laufen nun auch in Chicago, genauer gesagt im internationalen Wettbewerb des Chicago International Film Festival, das dieses Jahr 60. Jubiläum begeht. „Der Spatz im Kamin“ sogar als US-Premiere („Transamazonia“ tut dies Anfang Oktober beim New York Film Festival). Ebenfalls nach Chicago wurde Mohammad Rasoulofs vielgepriesener „Die Saat des heiligen Feigenbaums“ (hier unsere Spot-Besprechung) eingeladen, der von...

Die 19. Ausgabe des Rome Film Festival startet am 16. Oktober. Zur Official Selection gehört auch „Es geht um Luis“ von Lucia Chiarla mit Max Riemelt und Natalia Rudziewicz, der zuvor im Spielfilmwettbewerb des Zff Weltpremiere feiert. Weltpremiere in Rom feiert Bille Augusts Serie „The Count of Monte Cristo“, bei der Volker Bertelmann die Musik komponierte.

„Es geht um Luis“ von Lucia Chiarla (Credit: Across Nations Filmverleih Ug)

Nach seiner Weltpremiere im Spielfilmwettbewerb des Zff reist „Es geht um Luis“ von Lucia Chiarla weiter nach Rom: Dorthin wurde der zweite Kinospielfilm der gebürtigen Italienerin, die seit vielen Jahren in Berlin lebt und auch Schauspielerin ist, ebenfalls eingeladen. Die Hauptrollen spielen Max Riemelt und Natalia Rudziewicz. „Es geht um Luis“ wurde von ostlicht filmproduktion produziert und erzählt von einem Paar, dessen ohnehin schon angespannter Alltag aus den Fugen gerät, als der zehnjähriger Sohn Luis Probleme in der Schule hat. Im Spagat zwischen der...

The Rome Film Festival has unveiled the line-up for its 19th edition, which takes place from October 16-27.

Rome will present a lifetime achievement award to Johnny Depp, who will present Modi - Three Days on the Wing of Madness, about Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani, at the festival.

Viggo Mortensen will also receive a lifetime achievement award, and will present The Dead Don’t Hurt, which he wrote, directed and stars in.

Francis Ford Coppola will also be in Rome for a special ‘pre-opening’ festival presentation of the Italian premiere of Megalopolis at Cinecittà Studios – the Rome studio that hosted him...

The Venice Film Festival wrapped on Saturday (September 7) night with key prizes for Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door, Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, Dea Kulumbegashvili’s April and Maura Delpero’sVermiglio, while Nicole Kidman won best actress for Babygirl and Vincent Lindon best actor for The Quiet Son.

Screen rounds up key talking points from the festival.

Stars arrive in force…

Last year, the strikes kept the stars away. This year, Venice was brimming with big names, among them George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Nicole Kidman, Angelina Jolie, Joaquin Phoenix, Lady Gaga, Daniel Craig, Tilda Swinton, Julianne Moore and Jude Law.

Se trata de la primera película española en ganar el León de Oro en toda la historia del Festival de Cine de Venecia. © Getty Images

La 81 edición del prestigioso Festival de Venecia ha llegado a su fin, marcando un hito en la historia del cine español. La película La habitación de al lado, dirigida por Pedro Almodóvar y protagonizada por Tilda Swinton y Julianne Moore, el que es su primer largometraje rodado íntegramente en inglés, se ha alzado con el codiciadísimo León de Oro, el máximo galardón de la Biennale. Y, decimos que es historia, porque se trata de la primera vez que una película española obtiene este galardón.

Históricamente, Venecia ha sido un trampolín para las películas que aspiran a la gloria en los Oscar. De las diez últimas ganadoras del León de Oro, cuatro han sido nominadas al Oscar a la mejor película, y dos de ellas (La forma del agua...

Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore in ‘The Room Next Door’ (Photo Credit: Sony Classics)

The 2024 Venice Film Festival winners were announced on September 7th, with Oscar-winner Pedro Almodóvar (Talk to Her) earning the Golden Lion for Best Film for The Room Next Door. Almodóvar took home the coveted prize for this first English-language film, and he dedicated the win to his family. “It is my first movie in English but the spirit is Spanish,” said the acclaimed filmmaker.

Academy Award-winner Nicole Kidman was named Best Actress for her starring role in director Halina Reijn’s Babygirl. Kidman wasn’t able to attend the ceremony, and Reijn read a statement accepting the award. “Today, I arrived in Venice to find out shortly after that my brave and beautiful mother Janelle Ann Kidman has just passed. I’m in shock and I have to go to my family. But this award is for her.

This terrific character study by Delphine and Muriel Coulin comes at an apposite time in today’s climate, as far-right political groups all over the globe increasingly get their claws into the angry and dispossessed. It’s also an unusually inquisitive look at the bonds that exist between men: their tribes, rituals and — ultimately — their responsibilities. Central to its very primal depiction of the gulf between left and right is star Vincent Lindon as Pierre, a widowed father of young men in provincial France who tries in vain to stop his eldest son becoming radicalized by his friends and by online hate groups; Lindon’s soulful turn rightly snagged him the Venice Film Festival’s Best Actor award.

The boy’s name is Fus (Benjamin Voison), and the dynamic between father and son is established with incredible economy in the opening scenes. Pierre has been working all night on the railway track,...

Venice Film Festival jury president Isabelle Huppert expressed support for Nicole Kidman after the actress was unable to accept her Best Actress prize for Babygirl in person, due to her mother’s death.

Kidman had traveled to Italy to receive the award but had to get back on a plane shortly after landing.

“I just wanted to express my compassion to Nicole Kidman, who can’t be here tonight, who had to go back unexpectedly, and I just want to tell her that we really miss her and we love her,” Huppert told the jury press conference.

Isabelle Huppert expresses condolences to Nicole Kidman following her mother’s passing.

Huppert says “we love you, Nicole” and explains why the jury awarded Kidman the Best Actress prize #Venezia81 pic.twitter.com/FKdn5YTIFU

— Deadline (@Deadline) September 7, 2024

Earlier at the awards ceremony, Babygirl director Halina Reijn had read out a message from...

Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door won the Golden Lion for best film at the 2024 Venice Film Festival.

Almodóvar’s first English-language feature marks the first time he has won the top award at one of the three major film festivals. Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore star in the story of a woman who makes the decision to end her life, and the friend who re-enters her world around this time.

Scroll down for the full list of winners

Sony Pictures Classics will release the film in the US on December 20, with Warner Bros handling multiple international territories including UK-Ireland.

Nicole Kidman won the best actress prize at Venice Film Festival for her performance in “Babygirl” on Saturday night, but was not on hand to accept the prize because of some devastating news.

After Kidman’s name was announced, “Babygirl” director Halina Reijn took the stage and delivered written remarks in place of Kidman, revealing that the actor had traveled to Venice to attend the ceremony but had to leave due to news of her mother’s death.

“Today, I arrived in Venice to find out shortly after my brave and beautiful mother, Janelle Anne Kidman, had just passed,” Kidman wrote. “I’m in shock and I have to go to my family, but this award is for her.”

The statement continued, “She shaped me, she guided me and she made me. I am beyond grateful that I get to say her name to all of you through Halina. The...

Pedro Almodovar‘s, “The Room Next Door,” just moved to the top tier of Oscar contenders with a big win at the Venice Film Festival. It picked up the top prize, the Golden Lion, on September 7. This recognition, from a jury headed up by French actress Isabelle Huppert, came just days after it debuted on the rialto to a rapturous reception.

The Oscar champ’s first English language feature tells the tale of Ingrid (Oscar winner Julianne Moore) and Martha (Oscar winner Tilda Swinton), who were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. Ingrid went on to become a novelist while Martha was a war reporter, and they were separated by the circumstances of life. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme but strangely sweet situation.

This is the second English language film in a row to win this precursor prize.

Pedro Almodóvar’s “The Room Next Door” won the Golden Lion at the 81st Venice Film Festival. The Spanish auteur’s first feature in English took the top prize at the awards ceremony on Saturday, where he accepted the honor in person. Based on Sigrid Nunez’s novel “What Are You Going Through,” the film stars Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore as friends who reunite after several years.

Though Almodóvar’s latest was not reviewed as enthusiastically as most of his films (a high bar to cross), the drama was still favored to do well at the Venice awards. When it premiered earlier this week, it was met with a lengthy standing ovation of almost 20 minutes — a warm reception even for festival audiences. And few are the cinephiles in Europe who do not consider the director of “All About My Mother,” “Talk to Her,” “Volver,” “Bad Education” and “Parallel Mothers” a living great.

While last year’s strikes created a somewhat subdued energy on the Lido with very few talent able to be present, this year’s 2024 Venice Film Festival proved to hot and steamy. And we’re not just talking about the excessive heat movie stars and fan alike were subjected to. Films like Halina Reijn’s erotic thriller “Babygirl” and Luca Guadagnino’s adaptation of William S. Burrough’s short novel “Queer” aroused audience interest with career-best performances from Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig and highly revealing sexual interplay. However it was Pedro Almodóvar’s “The Room Next Door” that took home the coveted Golden Lion, marking the first time the filmmaker has won a top prize at any major festival throughout his career.

Brady Corbet returned to the Palazzo del Cinema with his four-hour post-wwii epic “The Brutalist,” which screened to rave reception and earned the director the Silver Lion,...

The 2024 Venice Film Festival awards ceremony has wrapped up after a sweltering week and a half on the Lido.

The prestigious Golden Lion award for best film went to Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door. The Spaniard’s first-ever English-language feature received a whopping 17-minute standing ovation when it premiered at the festival. Almodóvar said in his acceptance speech Saturday: “I would like to dedicate it to my family, who is here now… This movie The Room Next Door, it is my first movie in English.. but the spirit is Spanish.”

His film, an adaptation of Sigrid Nunez’s novel What Are You Going Through, follows best-selling writer Ingrid (Julianne Moore) and Martha (Tilda Swinton) as they rekindle their friendship after losing touch. As they immerse themselves in past memories, anecdotes, art and movies, Martha, battling terminal cervical cancer, wants to die with dignity and asks Ingrid to be...

Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door has won the Venice Film Festival’s Golden Lion main prize.

Jury president Isabelle Huppert and her jury were on hand to bestow the Golden Lion along with the other main prizes. Scroll down to see the list of laureates.

Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore star in Almodóvar’s euthanasia drama, which marked the acclaimed filmmaker’s English-language debut.

The movie follows Ingrid (Moore) and Martha (Swinton) who were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme and bittersweet situation. Check out our review here.

Among other prize-winners on the night were Vermiglio by Maura Delpero, Brady Corbet for The Brutalist, and Nicole Kidman for Babygirl whose filmmaker Halina Reijn accepted the award on behalf of Kidman who she explained could not be there in...

“The Quiet Son,” a French film exploring family dynamics amidst far-right radicalization, has won the 2024 Collateral Impact Award at the 81st Venice Film Festival. The award, presented by Think-Film Impact Production and Impact Europe, recognizes films with significant societal impact potential.

Written and directed by Delphine Coulin and Muriel Coulin, the cast features Vincent Lindon, Benjamin Voisin and Stefan Crepon.

A high-profile jury selected the winner, comprising Adjoa Andoh, Chiwetel Ejiofor (“12 Years a Slave”), Alia Shawkat, Mstyslav Chernov, and Misan Sagay. The jury cited the film’s urgency in sparking conversation about the rise of the far-right and its societal impact.

During a Venice Production Bridge panel, jury members shared their thoughts on cinematic impact. Ejiofor highlighted cinema’s role in communicating real-world situations, stating: “Cinema can inspire leaders and legislators and help facilitate genuine lasting change.”

Andoh added: “The notion of having an intentional organization like Think-Film Impact...

Set in a small town in northeastern France, The Quiet Son tells the moving story of a tight-knit family facing turmoil when the eldest son joins a radical far-right group. Directed by sisters Delphine and Muriel Coulin, the film had its world premiere at the 2021 Venice Film Festival, where it showcased the personal toll of rising political polarization.

We’re introduced to Pierre, a devoted father and railway worker, and his sons—the athletic but directionless Fus and the studious Louis. Despite tragedy in their past, the three share a strong bond. But this stability is threatened when Fus becomes involved with a gang of violent nationalists. As his beliefs grow in extremism, tensions rise with his father, a proud leftist who can’t comprehend what’s led his boy astray.

The directors handle this divisive subject with empathy rather than accusation. Through everyday scenes of the family quietly unraveling,...

If you’re one of those people whose first instinct in cases of youth violence is to blame the parents, “The Quiet Son,” the new Venice-competing title from directors Delphine and Muriel Coulin (“17 Girls”) has a valuable perspective, telling the believably downbeat story of a 22-year-old French guy who becomes embroiled in right-wing street politics, exclusively from the point of view of his loving but uncomprehending father. If, however, you’re already of the opinion that the issue is more complex than simple parental negligence, the solidly straightforward film has less to offer, as it states and restates the problem of rising, increasingly aggressive alt-right sympathies among young, working class populations, without providing any novel or particularly useful insights into it.

Adapted by the Coulin sisters from the book “Ce qu’il faut de nuit” by Laurent Petitmangin, the film’s main attraction beyond its torn-from-the-headlines topicality, is Vincent Lindon...

For the close-knit and loving French family at the center of directors Delphine and Muriel Coulin’s intensely intimate new drama, The Quiet Son (Jouer avec le feu), home is where the heart is, and politics are probably best left at the doorstep.

Unfortunately, the opposite winds up happening to hardworking single dad Pierre (Vincent Lindon) when his oldest son, Fus (Benjamin Voisin), veers far to the right, joining a band of radical thugs committing violent acts around the neighborhood.

How do you stop a child from pursuing political beliefs that are diametrically opposed to yours — beliefs that could be dangerous? Is it better to let them follow their own path, in the hopes that they’ll eventually come around? Or do you try and intervene at some point, with the risk of pushing them even further in the wrong direction?

Those are the questions guiding the Coulins’ gripping and well-performed fourth feature,...

Metal Baby

August has been a wild ride so far. Between art house discussions of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Santa Sangre (listen) and Paul Morrissey’s Blood for Dracula (listen), we squeezed in a look at screenlife sequel Unfriended: Dark Web (listen). Now we’re ready for more contemporary foreign content with Julia Ducournau‘s sophomore feature, Titane (2021).

In the film, after a run of poorly timed murders, serial killer Alexia (Agathe Rousselle) goes on the run from the police. After shaving her head and breaking her nose, Alexia disguises herself as “Adrien,” the long-missing son of aging fire captain Vincent (Vincent Lindon).

The distraught father pledges to protect his offspring from harm, but considering Alexia’s literal Cadillac ride (ie: sex) has resulted in pregnancy, how long can Alexia or Vincent keep up the ruse? And what happens if/when the truth comes out?

Be sure to subscribe to the...

Las españolas ‘Una Ballena’ y ‘Apocalipsis Z: El Principio del Fin’ en competición.

El Festival Internacional de Cine Fantástico de Sitges ha comenzado la cuenta atrás para su próxima edición con el anuncio de sus primeros títulos.

Entre las películas más esperadas se encuentran “A Different Man”, el thriller psicológico de comedia negra protagonizado por Sebastian Stan, “Cuckoo”, la película de Neon protagonizada por Hunter Schafer, “The Second Act”, la película de Quentin Dupieux que abrió la última edición del Festival de Cannes protagonizada por Léa Seydoux, Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon y Raphaël Quenard, la película de la conocida saga de terror, “Terrifier 3”, el filme dirigido por Jang Jae-hyun “Exhuma”, o “Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In”, la película que se proyectó en la sesión de Medianoche de la última edición del Festival de Cannes, llena de acción y artes marciales.

Las producciones españolas que competirán en la sección...

Illustrations by Maddie Fischer.For more Cannes 2024 coverage, subscribe to the Weekly Edit newsletter.The Second Act.There is a filmmaker who makes movies that are above all conceptual, with the story but a brittle skeleton barely holding the thing together. He makes at least one movie a year, all under 90 minutes, all modestly casual affairs with various doses of drollness; and all feature a philosophical premise or metaphysical quandary at their core. He writes, directs, shoots, and edits the films himself. Dissenters tend to think he isn’t funny and that all his movies are tedious and basically the same; fans, of course, hold the opposite opinion. He opened the Cannes Film Festival this year, but despite what you may assume, this filmmaker isn’t Hong Sang-soo; rather, it’s Quentin Dupieux, who also shares with Hong a cinema of welcome brevity and levity. These might be the reasons...

The Cannes Film Festival is many things: A prestigious platform for the best of world cinema, a massive industry event where film acquisitions get made, a testament to the French film industry’s classism and rampant sexual abuse. But more than anything, it’s one of the world’s greatest photo opps.

Sure, sure, everyone wants the Palme D’or. But even more people would kill to get seen on the iconic Cannes red carpet, and get their picture snapped by the hordes of press that camp on the Croisette. Some of the world’s most glamorous and beautiful celebrities can be seen on the steps outside the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès every year posing for the cameras, and while it’s not quite the fashion moment that the Met Gala is, it still offers a great opportunity for us pleebs to gawk at some particularly shiny stars in all of their finery.

Chinese filmmaker Zou Jing has won the €2,500 Next Step Hildegarde award from Cannes’ Critics’ Week for her upcoming debut feature A Girl Unknown. Didar Domehri of France’s Maneki Films has come on to co-produce the film with Yan Wang of China-France production house Memoria Films.

The film is a coming-of-age tale about identity that follows the journey of a young Chinese girl from age six through her thirties who lives with three different families.

It explores how China’s one-child policy affected generations of abandoned girls in the country from the 1980s to the 2000s.

The writer-director previously won...

by Cláudio Alves

Triangle Of Sadness (2022) Ruben Östlund

Though the movie's but a premise in its director's imagination, The Entertainment System Is Down is shaping up to be a starry affair. Ruben Östlund's follow-up to Triangle of Sadness, his second Palme d'Or winner, has been on the news. The Swedish provocateur even did a press conference at the Croisette, joined by Keanu Reeves and Kirsten Dunst, both set to take part in the satire cum disaster movie. Other cast members include Samantha Morton, Daniel Brühl, Nicolas Braun, and Vincent Lindon.

In case you've forgotten, the French thespian presided over the Cannes Jury that decided on that Triangle of Sadness victory…...

French actor Vincent Lindon has joined the increasingly crowded cast of Ruben Östlund’s The Entertainment System is Down.

He joins previously announced Keanu Reeves, Kirsten Dunst, Daniel Bruhl, Samantha Morton and Nicolas Braun.

The project is set to start shooting in 2025 and is set on a long-haul flight where the entertainment system fails and passengers are forced to face the horror of being bored.

In a full circle moment, seasoned French actor Lindon was jury president in Cannes in 2022 when Östlund’s Triangle Of Sadness won the Palme d’Or.

The film, Östlund’s seventh and his second in the English language,...

Illustrations by Maddie Fischer.For more Cannes 2024 coverage, subscribe to the Weekly Edit newsletter.In a welcome twist, the most pressing questions I heard on my way to Cannes this year didn’t concern the festival lineups but events that seemed to transcend them. In the days leading up to the opening night, Sous les écrans la dèche, a collective of festival workers, announced it would be striking over salary increases and unemployment benefits; as I type, the strikes haven’t materialized, nor has the rumored list of new sexual abuse allegations about men in the French film industry. “Last year, as you know, we had some polemics,” artistic director Thierry Frémaux told the press on the eve of the fest, hinting at the decision to open the 2023 edition with Maïwenn’s Jeanne du Barry, a film that would have been forgotten a lot faster than it was had it...

Léa Seydoux with her The Second Act co-star Raphaël Quenard Photo: Richard Mowe Léa Seydoux, the star of The Second Act, Quentin Dupieux’s Cannes Film Festival opening film, considers herself fortunate at the start of her career not to have been subjected to the kind of inappropriate behaviour suffered by some of her contemporaries.

At a media gathering after last night’s world premiere in the 77th edition of the festival the one-time James Bond girl confessed: “I’ve been a very fortunate person as an actress. From the beginning I worked with people who respected me - more or less. It’s difficult to compare, however, as some women were really victims and went through a very serious experience.”

Having emerged relatively unscathed she sensed that her stature and standing had protected her. “When you’re a young actress, you are vulnerable,” she said.

Director Quentin Dupieux treats...

by Cláudio Alves

Léa Seydoux and Vincent Lindon in The Second Act.

Another year, another edition of the Cannes at Home miniseries, specially made to combat cinephile Fomo for those of us not at the French Riviera. For the next week or so, let's explore the filmographies of directors in competition. However, since the festival opened with the latest Quentin Dupieux project, it seems fitting to start our at-home festival by considering the auteur's career and the oddball creations that have made him something of a king of weirdness within contemporary French cinema. Not that such status comes with guaranteed acclaim. The opposite is true, with Dupieux's cinema caught in perpetual polemic, each work more divisive than what came before.

Such is the case with The Second Act, where the director proposes a comedy on the absurdities of making an AI-based film. Not even Léa Seydoux, Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon,...

Cannes regular Léa Seydoux joined playful press conference for fest opener The Second Act, where talk occasionally turned serious as the actress was peppered with several questions from the international press about her thoughts on the #MeToo era.

“I have been a very fortunate person as an actress. At the beginning of my career, I worked with people who respected me, more or less,” said Seydoux. “Some women were really victims. But in my case, I can’t compare with someone women who really went through and experienced very serious things.”

#MeToo is a contentious issue in France, where the perception is the entertainment industry has been slow to evolve. Seydoux has previously spoken about challenging conditions on Blue is the Warmest Color, her 2013 Palme d’Or winner that landed her international fame, and featured a 7-minute lesbian sex scene that took 10 days to shoot, while the film involved upwards...

In Quentin Dupieux’s new satirical comedy The Second Act, which kicked off the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday night, the pic takes poke at myriad culture wars, including France’s latest #MeToo movement. Asked front and center about her take on the latest wave, the pic’s star Léa Seydoux said “It’s a wonderful thing that women are speaking out. It’s about high time they did.”

“This change has been taking place. The film also plays with this idea. It also talks about very current events, and this movement where women are now speaking out and that was a fundamental importance of that change to take place,” said the 007 actress.

“I see there’s been a change, we’ve moved on,” said Seydoux, who came up as a young actress in the biz.

Later expounding, the actress emphasized the changes she’s seen in the industry due...

Léa Seydoux addressed France’s growing #MeToo movement at the Cannes Film Festival press conference for Quentin Dupieux’s comedy “The Second Act,” which opened the fest on Tuesday night.

“It’s a wonderful thing that women are now speaking out. Things are clearly changing and it was high time it did,” she said. “I have the impression that this change has indeed taken place. The film also plays with this idea, it also talks about very current events and this movement, where women are now speaking out, and that was of fundamental importance for this change to take place.”

Seydoux continued, “#MeToo is very important. It’s a very serious issue. However, I think it is also necessary to be able to talk about it with humor. In the film, this is highlighted in a very funny way.”

Addressing the impact of #MeToo on the way actresses are treated on set,...

Quentin Dupieux returns with The Second Act, a playfully dour satire on the film industry that sees the French absurdist delve further into the apocalyptic mood and gallows humor of his recent Yannick. The Cannes opener stars some of the biggest names in the French film world as heightened versions of themselves: actors working on a film within the film (and perhaps a film within that), a conceit that allows them to break the fourth wall, basically winking at the audience conspiratorially while taking passing shots at themselves and some of the hands that feed them. It’s all in good fun, of course. It’s also quite inside baseball––not that that mattered at the premiere, though you do have to wonder how it might resonate going forward.

Selected to raise the curtain on the world’s most prestigious film festival, The Second Act rolled moments after the opening ceremony closed,...

It could have been hopelessly self-indulgent but Quentin Dupieux’s anarchic and quirky sense of humour finds full flavour in this amusing “appetiser” which still leaves you hankering after a full meal.

Better that than overstaying its welcome as his cast play around with the foibles and artifice of their craft as they are gathered together to make a romantic comedy.

The collective view is that they are making a pretty dire production and to liven things up they keep interrupting the shoot to voice their own grievances against each other, the script and the unseen director who keeps shouting, “Cut!”

Most of the film unfurls in a roadside pub called The Second Act, presided over by the lumbering barkeeper (played by Manuel Guillot).

Working out where the play-acting stops and the “real” action begins is enough to keep you on the edge of interest...

The stormy clouds outside the Palais might have dampened some spirits as the credits rolled on the opening night film of the 77th Cannes Film Festival. Or maybe it was the movie itself.

“The Second Act,” Quentin Dupieux’s talky French comedy about the making of the first movie directed by AI, mustered a lukewarm 3.5-minute standing ovation on Tuesday night in Cannes.

Dupieux attedned the premiere along with his French cast of Léa Seydoux, Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon and Raphaël Quenard. The four actors all politely stood as a camera quickly passed by through the tepid applause.

In the meta film, these French stars play actors making a romantic comedy they know is pointless, as it’s the first movie written and directed by AI. In the opening scenes, we learn that Florence (Seydoux) wants to take things to the next level with David (Garrel), but he is no...

Cannes film festival

With help from an A-list cast, Dupieux brings his customary mischief to an amiable tale of imposture and role play

Cannes can always do worse than choose a comedy for its opening gala, and the festival is off to an amiable, entertaining start. Quentin Dupieux brings the wackiness onstream with this cheerfully mischievous, unrepentantly facetious fourth-wall-badgering sketch. It’s a sprightly meta gag, a movie about a movie, or perhaps a movie about a movie about a movie – or perhaps just a movie, full stop, whose point is to claim that reality as we experience it inside and outside the cinema is unitary despite the levels of imposture and role-play we bring to it. It is all just one unbroken skein of experience like the endless dolly-track (the temporary rail that lets the camera move smoothly) that Dupieux finally shows us.

There are plenty of laugh lines,...

With 13 features made since 2007, and six in the past four years, French DJ-turned-director Quentin Dupieux is clearly no slacker. Not only has he helmed all these films — he’s also written, shot and edited them, as well as composed many of their scores.

Starting with his surreal deadpan début, Rubber, and up through last year’s Yannick and Daaaaali!, Dupieux has had an impressively prolific run, gradually improving with each new movie while honing a style and tone that are completely his own.

If, however, there’s one drawback to this incessant activity, it’s that his films all have very short running times because they tend to lack classic denouements. They’re well-executed, high-concept affairs blending comedy, sci-fi, horror and other genres in fun ways, but they often play out like long second acts without real endings.

Dupieux was perhaps aware of this flaw when he decided to call...

Something has subtly shifted in Quentin Dupieux’s perspective, leaving the one-man-band of French cinema a rather different auteur than the anti-comedy punk that nearly stumbled onto the festival stage so many years ago. Chalk it up to maturity or to an impressive professional rise — reaching new highs this year with the opening slot at the Cannes Film Festival — but the director’s tone has softened and his targets have shifted, even as his working methods (and working ethic) remain set-in-stone.

Like a distant Gallic cousin to Wes Anderson and Hong Sang-soo (now there are two names you rarely see together), Dupieux has connected a distinctive voice into a well-honed system built for productivity, allowing him to write-direct-shoot-edit-and-score a new film every year. And sometimes, he finds time for two.

Within the past twelve months, he’s brought films “Yannick” and “Daaaaaalí!” to Locarno and Venice, and now steps into...

The 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival is officially underway in the South of France as A-listers, auteurs and America’s most revered actress, Meryl Streep, converged at the Palais’ Grand Theatre Lumiere on Tuesday for a typically glamorous opening ceremony.

The anticipation was as thick as the clouds in the sky on Tuesday as rain was not the only threat hanging over the start of this year’s festival. From a possible strike and a fresh #MeToo discussion in France to the ongoing conflict in Gaza, festival officials have faced many questions in the days and hours leading up to Tuesday night. During his annual kick-off press conference, festival boss Thierry Fremaux sidestepped looming issues and tried to center the main attraction and the core mission of delivering world-class cinema. “We are trying to have a festival without these polemics,” he said, encouraging people (particularly the press) to...

Et voilà, The Second Act, a bubbly apéritif to open this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and the latest bit of mischief from Quentin Dupieux, the Loki of the French cinematic universe. Dupieux turns out a film roughly once a year, featuring protagonists ranging from a rogue rubber tire cruising the highway for victims to a giant fly captured by a couple of petty crooks who try to turn it into a sideshow attraction. Each wacky new romp brings new fans into the tent and, on the evidence of his recent cast lists, entices more big-name actors to run away and join his circus.

So roll up here to see Bond girl Léa Seydoux, the baggy-eyed veteran Vincent Lindon and the usually smoldering Louis Garrel along with a troupe of faces familiar to Dupieux’s audience. The three of them play actors shooting what appears to be an especially banal rom-com.

In France, the concept of irony is referred to as “deuxième degré” (second degree), where the “premier degré” is the literal or surface meaning, which can be twisted as audiences read an entirely different, often contrary meaning into the material. But the game doesn’t necessarily stop there. There is also “troisième degré,” “quatrième degré” and so on, as deep as you want to go.

For absurdist trickster Quentin Dupieux (whose films “Deerskin” and “Rubber” have found a cult following), “The Second Act” presents a frivolous fun-house mirror, in which actors Léa Seydoux, Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon and Raphaël Quenard play actors playing actors in a pointless romantic comedy. They all know they’re making a bad movie, and one by one, they keep interrupting the shoot to air their personal grievances. But that’s only the beginning in a slender meta-textual doodle selected to kick off the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

The 2024 Cannes Film Festival competition jury, led by president Greta Gerwig, met the international press Tuesday — and it didn’t take long before the assembled stars were urged to address the various fraught political issues swirling around this year’s edition of the world’s most glamorous film fest.

On the eve of the 77th festival, Cannes artistic director Thierry Frémaux had set the tone by attempting to distance the event from hot-button topics, saying at his own press conference on Monday, “We are trying to have a festival without these polemics. In Cannes, the politics should be on the screen.”

The French festival head, who has served in his role since 2001, noted how coverage of Cannes has changed over his tenure, as the international media’s interest has shifted from the films on exhibition to an expectation that the festival be responsive to surrounding social issues. That was certainly the case Tuesday,...

Arthouse streamer Mubi has snatched up Andrea Arnold’s Bird for the U.K. and Ireland ahead of the film’s world premiere in competition in Cannes.

Barry Keoghan, Franz Rogowski, Nykiya Adams, and Jason Buda co-star in the new drama from the American Honey and Red Road director. The film follows a 12-year-old who lives with her brother and single dad in a squat in North Kent. As she approaches puberty she seeks attention and adventure elsewhere.

Bird was produced by Tessa Ross, Juliette Howell and Lee Groombridge for House Productions (The Iron Claw, The Wonder).

Cornerstone is handling international sales for Bird and is co-repping U.S. rights with CAA Media Finance.

Recent Mubi releases include Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, Wim Wender’s Perfect Days, Molly Manning Walker’s How to Have Sex, and Aki Kaurismäki’s Fallen Leaves, all festival hits. The streamer’s upcoming slate includes Levan Akin’s Crossing,...

The Olympic flame is coming to the Cannes Film Festival red carpet.

The 77th edition of the Festival de Cannes will serve as a preview for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games with the premiere screening of Mickaël Gamrasni’s documentary “Olympiques! La France des Jeux” on May 21.

Paris 2024, in agreement with the Mairie de Cannes, is offering the flame to the film festival as a preview before it’s officially welcomed by the city of Cannes on June 18 along the Olympic Torch Relay, which began in Marseille on May 8. Sports personalities and athletes will be the guests of honor at the special screening: Tony Estanguet (pictured above), Marie-José Pérec, Thierry Rey, Iliana Rupert, Marie Patouillet, Nélia Barbosa, Alexis Hanquiquant, Christine Caron and Brahim Asloum will flank Paralympic champion Arnaud Assoumani, who will carry the Olympic flame onto the red carpet.

“What a joy it is to welcome such a host of Olympic stars,...

What to expect from Cannes 2024? The global selection offers critics plenty to write about — after all, this is the festival d’auteurs. But this year’s edition may be light on the red carpet glitz that lures celebrities to the Côte d’Azur for eye-popping photo memes and offshore yacht revels. Remember Madonna’s 1991 pointy Gaultier bustier? Elizabeth Taylor holding her white dog as “Cliffhanger” star Sylvester Stallone climbed the steps to meet her at the top? Such viral moments are what Cannes director Thierry Fremaux dreams of.

High-octane stars expected to hit the Palais photo gauntlet include two-time Oscar-winner Emma Stone, who stars in all three stories in competition title “Kinds of Kindness” (Searchlight), Yorgos Lanthimos’ edgy follow-up to $100-million grosser “Poor Things.” Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth will add some sizzle for out-of-competition prequel “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” (Warner Bros.), George Miller’s rollercoaster return after 2015’s Oscar-winning “Mad Max: Fury Road.