Cannes Diary: Three Palme d'Or Contenders and My Pick for "Best Actress"

Diana Drumm is reporting from Cannes for The Film Experience... 

With the festival dwindling away (as well as this writer’s sanity -- blame the multiple transit strikes, weather and barely affordable lodging), we are closing in on the more probable awards contenders. Out of the hubbub heard in person and online, along with opinions from mine own wonky eyes, here are three that could possibly take home either the Palme d’Or or Best Actress. (Juliette Binoche in Sils Maria I have yet to see...)

Mommy, Two Days One Night and Maps to the Stars after the jump...

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27 Dresses (2014, Cannes)

Adele, Julianne, Fonda, Zhang HuiwenSarah Gadon, The Swankster, Jess, Marion Cotillard
Eva Green, Alice Braga, The Sparking Diamond, Chiara MastroianniSophia Loren, Juli (again), Gong Li, Our Reigning "Best Actress"
Nicole's BFF, Salma, Amelie/Audrey, Amber HeardAishwaryai Rai, Blake Lively, Marion (again), Léa SeydouxChristina Hendricks, Zhang Ziyi, and Deneuve

 27 Dresses (2014), premiered at Cannes. This has been a co-production of The United States, China, Canada, Australia, England, India, Mexico, Brazil, and France.

Cannes Tidbits: Mommy, Foxcatcher, Two Days One Night, Lost River

And here is where the internet punishes me for being so woefully behind on my Oscar predictions. I had been planning to predict Channing Tatum for Best Supporting Actor since January... and I would have done so and people would have scoffed only to be blown away a mere month later by my prophetic gift when the Foxcatcher reviews hit at Cannes. 

Channing Tatum & Steve Carell headline. Will any movie ever campaign two leads again?

No matter that Chan is, by most accounts, the lead. You know how Oscar do with two-lead/same-gender movies - they cheat!

Foxcatcher isn't the only movie greeted with raves the past couple of days. In fact, it seems like with each day of the festival (which ends Sunday) we have a new Palme D'Or frontrunner. If you believe everything you read on Twitter, for example the winner is clearly going to be Two Days and One Night With Mr Turner & Foxcatcher's Mommy in Timbuktu. I've heard more than one critics proclaim Marion Cotillard the obvious winner of best actress for her leading role in Two Days One Night but haven't they been paying attention at past Cannes ceremonies? She's always the "sure thing" at that festival and she has yet to win. So try not to jinx her, s'il vous plait.

Not every movie is going to win a prize. Atom Egoyan's Captives was widely panned but seemed to quickly dissipate from the converation. Ryan Gosling's Lost River doesn't look like it's going to be so lucky. There's a certain level of joyful snark and target practice that only emerges from critics when a major star is involved in a project so that one appears to be the biggest punching pag since Grace of Monaco on opening night. [The No Duh Lesson: People care about Ryan Gosling and Nicole Kidman. They do not care about Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively]

After the jump a collection of Cannes tweets about Xavier Dolan's Mommy (and a few other movies) that have raised my eyebrows enough to share them.

 

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Cannes Monologue: Certified Copy

Andrew with another Cannes-themed monologue… 

At 50 Juliette Binoche remains one of the cinema’s finest actors – excellent in multiple languages. Though her time in Godzilla (now playing) is short, we can look forward to much more in Words and Pictures and Cannes entry Clouds of Sils Maris, the latter written specifically for her. Can Olivier Assayas film capture as many of her finest assetts as her Cannes winning turn in Certified Copy (2010)?

Certified Copy, my favourite of the decade (thus far), is remembered most often for its cerebral nature, a puzzle we must solve. Yes, much of it is rumination on theory but it's theory with passion and feeling. For all of its technical and intellectual merit, it’s also a love letter to Binoche from writer/director Abbas Kiarostami. 

Given it’s musings on what’s real and what’s a copy, Elle (Binoche’s character) might not quite qualify as a “real” woman - her name literally translates as “She” – as much as a platform for Kiarostami and Binoche to examine temperaments, hers change at the drop of hat, and ideas. The film makes you work but is all the more rewarding for it. Late in the movie, Elle and James head to quaint restaurant. They are no longer an affable writer and beleaguered fan they were at first but a beleaguered married couple.

She heads to the bathroom to put on lipstick and a pair of earrings. When she returns he doesn’t notice, too annoyed with the subpar wine. She tries to quell his moodiness. [More...]

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It's All About Jessica Chastain

Somehow Jessica Chastain is taking over Cannes week news despite not having a film in competition (though The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby is eligible for the Camera D'Or for her friend/director Ned Benson). She was nearly gone with the wind at a premiere the other night...

That's less a Marilyn than a Dorothy, don'cha know.

And then, the adorable starlet held court with students at the American Pavilion in Cannes, answering questions about her career.  And all this Cannes activity was swirling about during the big tornado of confusing news that she'd been offered the lead role in Season 2 of True Detective. Oh no wait a minute, actually she hasn't or she said no and they're pretending she wasn't offered. Or something.

We don't know.

Given that an Oscar statuette seems right around the corner, and she already does stage work maybe she'll have her sights set on the Triple Crown and hit the small screen as well?

I think it's worth noting that in the future EGOTs and Triple Crowns (TFE's preferred accomplishment since Grammys are such a different non-acting beast and who needs 'em?) will be much easier to win for actors with all the lines blurring between media and new shorter modes of television and new "limited run" stage shows becoming the norm. The length of the contracts is one reason, among others of course, that movie stars didn't used to regularly stick their toes in other mediums all that often. Now the water's the perfect temperature. 

If she was in fact offered it, do you think Jess should have said yes to True Detective? We still don't know the female lead but if you could have your choice of movie actresses for the miniseries, who would it be?