Red Carpet: Cannes Begins!
Wednesday, May 13, 2015 at 5:30PM 
A New Season of "Red Carpet Lineup" Begins...
NATHANIEL: Bonjour Jose. You're back on red carpet duty by popular request. I dared to post about the Met Gala without a conversation to go with it and I heard it from the readers.
JOSE: I'm moved but if they saw what I'm wearing now they wouldn't ask for me.
NATHANIEL: Always blame it on Laundry Day.
Before we begin proper can I just say that one thing I find exceptionally annoying about Cannes is when stars don't pose alone but only with groups. This seems to happen most with the Jury who are joined at the hip like they will be judged as a team in this maxi-challenge. And tonight Deneuve, the great lady of French cinema, stuck with her director Emmanuelle Bercot (whose opening night film Standing Tall has received warm notices) and the cast despite a rather becoming two-looks-in-one dress.
JOSE: She wants others to bask in her light, maybe? I do love her double gown. Two Face in a couture Batman
NATHANIEL: Opening Night always brings out the A listers so we have some of Oscar's favorite gown-wearers to discuss after the jump Natalie, Naomi, Lupita, and Our Juli...
PORTMAN, WATTS, NYONG'O, and GOD
JOSE: All of them sticking to the very French concept of deja vu
NATHANIEL: how so? I mean I see Naomi is in silver again which she has been known to do.
JOSE: Natalie looks like J.Law at the 2014 Oscars. Lupita combined her floral SAG dress with the green from BAFTA. Naomi is basically wearing a lesser version of her Marchesa from 2012 Cannes. I say enough with the pale hues, woman! Get thee to a color palette-ry. Or something...
NATHANIEL: My theory is she's too intimidated by color and fashion having logged so much time in Kidman's entourage. I mean, how could you ever hope to get noticed beside her?
JOSE: Couture PTSD.
Also, when did feathers make a comeback? Are Juli and Naomi hinting at wanting to play Fifi in the new Beauty and the Beast?
NATHANIEL: LOL. Is that the only role yet to be cast? The competition will be tough. Fifi's got Hollywood's favorite actress silhouette.
JOSE: You know Anne Hathaway is sitting somewhere waiting to get that call but I say Laura Benanti was born to play it... *insert nail polish emoji *
NATHANIEL: This is my favorite red carpet look Julianne has worn since the 1990s. I'm not even exagerrating. Perfect, she is perfect. And the best thing about it is that it feels like this supreme confidence post-Oscar look. Owning the world, or at least the stretch of it from The Dolby to the Théâtre Lumière.
JOSE: As she should! She looks like her character in A Single Man. Makes me wish she'd worn this Armani Prive to collect her Oscar as well, she looks *that * good.
NATHANIEL: No, no. It's a post-victory empress fierceness. If she'd have worn that to the Oscars all the winners would have had to encircle her and sacrifice their own Oscars to her in some dark we-are-not-worthy ritual.
Should we move on or do you have something to say about Lupita's green wonder-woman spinning on the red carpet.
JOSE: Just add a gif and let it speak for itself. It's like a couture version of that stupid top from Inception and I adore it in spite of the deja vu.
NATHANIEL: Don't you wish Natalie Portman would try a little harder. If you imagine her in Juli's outfit it's like Black Swan posession again.
JOSE: Stop before I go down a rabbit hole of re-casting Juli in the Barbara Hershey part me
NATHANIEL: There's no gif available of my head exploding so stop it.
Fan Bingbing, Isabella Rossellini, Emmanuelle Devos
Next photo! Did you know that Isabella Rossellini is also a Jury President? The main jury always gets all the attention but she's the President of Un Certain Regard this year.
JOSE: Really? She's so much more fun than the Coens too, we need a Rossellini uprising! Some awesome choices come out of those sideline lineups too and I have to say I love how loony the back of her cape is! The front is all "classy Gwyneth" and the back is "I do strange art projects where I dress as bugs"
NATHANIEL: Totally. At first glance it's all reserved lady but Isabella is sneaky with surprises
JOSE: That's what Cannes is for too: Boobs and capes and feathers and surprises! Leave the dull looks for the SAG awards.
NATHANIEL: It occurs to me that I don't know how you feel about stars kind of dressing down for these things. Emmanuelle Devos is a sensational actress but this strikes me as far too plain for opening night. Maybe for a different premiere later in the week after half the press has gone home?
JOSE: I don't approve maybe she knew no one would care what she wore if she was going to share a red carpet with Fan Binbing?
NATHANIEL: The plight of everyone. We've joked about this before with her Cannes appearances but I think they have to ship several trunks wherever she goes. Either that or she has sweatshops all over the world making her gowns for every night of the year. That woman is ALWAYS in couture. And on planes inbetween that. Or maybe she just teleports through her own Blink portals?
JOSE: I feel her transformations have little to do with actual human "getting dressed"... she lifts a wand and the clothes manifest.
Let it be said, she's also the only person alive who looks Ralph & Russo Couture look understated, in fact I can see her asking them to add more ribbons and flowers to her dresses
NATHANIEL: I imagine that actual flowers grow from the red carpet behind her when she walks, like Persephone blessing the earth with vegetation.
JOSE: Amen.
Reader Comments (14)
I'm getting unpleasant Seventh Son flashbacks from Juli.....
I think Lupita's gown also blends in her blue Prada from the Oscars now that you mention it.
The feathers tend to veer into RuPaul's Drag Race season finale/reunion special but I love both instances. Especially Julianne.
Fan is my favorite though. SO PRETTY.
The Met Gala and now Cannes! Yay! I wish Nicole drops by but she's probably off filming something.
Pretty sure Gugu Mbatha-Raw was cast as Fifi in Beauty and the Beast, though they're changing the name to Plumette.
BTW, I would spin like crazy off or on the red carpet if I wore a dress that had that capability.
Are Juli and Naomi wearing the same designer? They could be on the catwalk together in those matching feather explosions.
Lupita!!!!!! Goddamn!! Now that is a dress. All of these red carpet events such as that thing where everyone looks like a freak or the Oscars... that's child's play. Cannes is the Super Bowl of red carpet events and Lupita brings it! That dress and everything else. Magnificent.
" Don't you wish Natalie Portman would try a little harder?"
Yes. However you're asking this question, the answer is yes.
I liked Still Alice as well. And Julianne was amazing. She wasn't only long-overdue for that Oscar ... hers was easily my favorite performance of all the nominees. I think it's one of her best.
The scene that did it for me was the speech. Amazing.
Derreck: yes! Same silhouette, I even thought it was Prada when I first saw it! Alas it was Gucci.
San FranCinema: Juli is in Armani Prive, Naomi is in Elie Saab.
Emmanuelle Devos <3
(not even Moore could beat Hershey in Black Swan)
(this is first time ever that I don't like a Lupita look?)
Why's God wearing her Seventh Son costume.
i like the feathers. Don't care for Lupita (the color) or Deneuve (the cut).
No wonder Portman wore red - She's on fire lately! She's been linked to about 4 or 5 projects in the last week, the last one a biopic focusing on the few days of Jackie Kennedy's life after JFK's assassination.
Is Catherine Deneuve a Drag Race fan? That outfit was a maxi challenge two weeks ago.