The Festival de Cannes is upon us again, and if you were with us last year, we had a lot of fun covering the ups and downs of this iconic film and fashion event. After all, Cannes is a place where stars are born, and if you’re looking to get ahead of the game (any game, really) its best to stay up to date with all the festivities.
One moment an unknown is sky rocketed to unbelievable heights of stardom, fame, and critical acclaim for just one night at the star-studded gala that has been in existence since 1946.
This year promises to be as extravagant and elegant an affair as ever, with Baz Luhrmann’s epic telling of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” to open the competition. The film promises to bring back the Jazz Age with a roaring velocity only the 21st Century could handle.
Other notable candidates competing for the grand prize, the Palm D’Or, are Joel and Ethan Coen’s “Inside Llewellyn Davis” starring Justin Timberlake and Gatsby co-star Carey Mulligan, Takashi Miike’s “Straw Shield“, François Ozon’s “Young and Beautiful“, Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska“, Roman Polanski’s “Venus in Fur“, and our much-anticipated favourite “Only God Forgives” directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, which offers up a bad-ass vision of crime and the underworld set in the sweltering heat of Thailand and stars Ryan Gosling in the lead role (click here to watch trailer).
Also taking off at the festival is Sofia Coppola’s latest film on the scandal and psychology of “The Bling Ring” – the infamous crew of L.A. socialite-wannabes who took media outlets by storm after being caught in a string of celebrity burglaries. The film kicks off the Un Certain Regard category which also includes James Franco’s “As I Lay Dying“. Based off a novel by William Faulkner, the film is written, directed, and stars the offbeat actor, so hopefully people can start giving the guy a little more credit around these parts!
And if you’re not a fan of the contemporary film scene, not to worry, as the Cannes Film Festival line-up has built in dozens of classic films to showcase and celebrate at this year’s festival, showing that film past is just as powerful as film present, if not even more. After all, where would we be today without some of the great boundary-breaking films that got us here?
Elizabeth Taylor in “Cleopatra”
Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Emperor”
Alain Delon as Tom Ripley in “La Plein Soleil”
These films are icons of style as well as cinema, and include in the line up Alain Resnais’s stunningly poetic “Hiroshima, Mon Amour” (starring “Amour”;s Emanuelle Riva), Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s elaborate and sumptuous “Cleopatra”, Jacques Demy’s charmingly whimsical “Les Parapluies de Cherbourg”, Jean Cocteau’s “La Belle et la Bette” , Bernardo Bertolucci’s vivid 80’s epic “The Last Emperor”, and the creme de la creme of vintage menswear movies “Le Plein Soleil”, starring E.O.F. Style Idol Alain Delon as Patricia Highsmith’s cunning antihero Tom Ripley in Renee Clement’s classic 1960 film.
Another of the classics they are bringing to the screen at this year’s festival is Alfred Hitchock’s 1958 masterpiece “Vertigo”. To celebrate the new restoration of the film, the festival has invited the film’s star, Kim Novak, as the guest of honour to the Festival.
The film was not well-recieved well at all in the US upon its release, and misunderstood it remained for many years before the French propped it up for discussion as proof of Alfred Hitchcock’s auteurism (a term for a true artist of the cinema), so its no surprise to see the film celebrated to this day for its subtle artistry in creating an unsettling dreamlike mood that permeates throughout the entire story of “Vertigo”.
Here I was born, and there I died. It was only a moment for you;
you took no notice.
-Madeleine, “Vertigo”
[POP CULTURE MOMENT: Do you remember hearing the “Vertigo” soundtrack at the beginning of Lady Gaga’s “Born this Way” music video? Listen back to the narrative opening of the full music video and you can hear “Vertigo” ‘s haunting theme . This theme is one of Bernard Hermann’s most iconic compositions, second maybe only to the blitzkrieg of strings in “Psycho”. Click here to see.]
It’s stylish, cool, classy, and the twist at the end is bloody brilliant. There might never be another movie like it. We suggest you rent this classic and make a night in watching this with a glass of vino and pretend you’re at Cannes, then dress up like Jimmy Stewart the morning after.
Check out the official website for the full details and for more information about the 2013 Fesbertival De Cannes. If you can’t be there this year, be sure to check back for more updates as they come!
Until next time,
{theEye}
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