For the sake of good order and, as the man once wrote, in order to blacken a few more (cyberspace) pages, a brief note on the 67thCannes Film Festival, which started yesterday.
There´s 19 films in the official competition. The biggest quota is French (5 entries), followed by Italy (3) and the US (2). China also has 2 if you consider Taiwan and the PRC together. Australia, Canada, Greece, Hungary, Japan, Mexico and Norway have 1 entry each. There´s 6 1st timer directors, and one 1st timer 1st feature. Household names are Todd Haynes, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Hirokazu Koreeda, Nani Moretti, Gus van Sant and Jia Zhangke. (Very mild) curiosity is raised by Macbeth, directed by illustrious unknown (to The MacMahonian, that is) Justin Kurzel (although the track record of Shakesperare film adaptations, if that´s what this is, is dismal, to the exception of Orson Welles´s eponymous and Julie Taymor´s 1999 Titus Andronicus, which I seize this opportunity to humbly recommend), and Haynes´s Carol (exclusively because reportedly it is a Patricia Highsmith adaptation).
Out of competition there´s Woody Allen´s last, Immortal Man, and George Miller´s reworking of his own Mad Max, now subtitled Fury Road.
All in all, I don´t recall a less inspiring major festival lineup. Oh well.
There´s 19 films in the official competition. The biggest quota is French (5 entries), followed by Italy (3) and the US (2). China also has 2 if you consider Taiwan and the PRC together. Australia, Canada, Greece, Hungary, Japan, Mexico and Norway have 1 entry each. There´s 6 1st timer directors, and one 1st timer 1st feature. Household names are Todd Haynes, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Hirokazu Koreeda, Nani Moretti, Gus van Sant and Jia Zhangke. (Very mild) curiosity is raised by Macbeth, directed by illustrious unknown (to The MacMahonian, that is) Justin Kurzel (although the track record of Shakesperare film adaptations, if that´s what this is, is dismal, to the exception of Orson Welles´s eponymous and Julie Taymor´s 1999 Titus Andronicus, which I seize this opportunity to humbly recommend), and Haynes´s Carol (exclusively because reportedly it is a Patricia Highsmith adaptation).
Out of competition there´s Woody Allen´s last, Immortal Man, and George Miller´s reworking of his own Mad Max, now subtitled Fury Road.
All in all, I don´t recall a less inspiring major festival lineup. Oh well.