I've been watching the Cannes closing ceremonies with Glenn and having a laugh or five. My favorite bits are many but include...
...host Audrey Tatou's chirpy "oh la la" before the Palme D'Or
...president Steven Spielberg's weirdly nervous reveals of the winners
...Bérénice Bejo's surprise at winning Best Actress (damn is she ever looking gorgeous). Well, she was getting so good at losing.
...Ang Lee's entrance (why does the mere sight of him always fill me with joy?)
Awesome female directors, stage orgasms and actresses we now own (???) after the jump...
...Jane Campion presenting the short film prizes with Mads Mikkelsen. What a handsome & talented pair they make. If the Oscars invited artists this cool to present I'd be in heaven.
...and the odd couple juxtaposition of the legendary Agnes Varda with Zhang Ziyi who I always thought of as diminutive until she was just towering over Varda, like Peter Jackson was forcing perspective on them, reducing Varda to adorable little Hobbit.
Have they even heard of each other? You never know. I was thrown this week by the news that Cannes regular James Gray (Two Lovers, The Yards) was totally unfamiliar with Marion Cotillard before someone suggested her for The Immigrants when they met a social function. Apparently she threw a piece of bread at him during an argument!
But let's talk about sex...
Asia Argento sure wanted to! Her intro to Best Screenplay has to be seen to be believed. There isn't anything remotely lascivious in her scripted intro but if you didn't speak English you'd be convinced she was reciting something extremely erotic with her husky intonation, come hither expressions and lingerie gown tugging, until the climax when she, uh, basically climaxes. Asia has a perpetual carnal itch that can never be fully scratched! Frankly, it's kind of a wonder that she isn't a bigger star.
For all the excitement of the very brief ceremony the weirdest moment for me came with the Best Actress presentation. See, one of the chief complaints that's been lobbed at the Palme D'Or winner Blue is the Warmest Color over the past week has been the suggestion that its epic lesbian sex scene was closer to leering male fantasy in its POV and execution than character-driven passion. I haven't seen the film so I can't say if I agree but it made an awkward Best Actress moment even weirder in context. Orlando Bloom's Best Actress intro started with a quote from Ava Gardner.
An actress doesn't belong to herself. She belongs to those who watch her."
And proceeded like so:
Being watched. Being scrutinized. Being someone else's fantasy, a director's dream come true, or an audience's star or a juries favorite.
I had a brief chat with Nick about this and though we haven't much right to judge (actressexuals do get possessive) this is an incredibly sexist thing to say. Such an intro would NEVER accompany a Best Actor presentation. And besides, actresses do belong to themselves. I know because quite a few things would be different if all the actresses belonged to me!
It figures that the night would end with two actresses that I have always claimed dibs on. The strange cinematic sexuality of the evening continued straight on through the Palme D'Or presentation. Consider that the once NC-17 causing Uma Thurman was presenting it...
Please welcome the magnificent Uma Thurman."
...while Nicole Kidman applauded her entrance.
And then Uma hung around the edges of the Palme D'Or winning trio while they were being celebrated for their explicit sex movie whilst we, the audience who apparently own her, could contemplate that she has her own explicit sex movie coming right up (Lars von Trier's Nymphomaniac) in the role that was originally to be played by Nicole Kidman.
I second Asia Argento's onanism.
Oh la la. The Cinema. It's a small world after all. And a sexy one.