Cannes 2018. The First Films Announced!

by Nathaniel R

Best Actress possibility? Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani (About Elly, Paterson) and French star Emmanuelle Bercot headline the cast of "Girls of the Sun" about a Kurdish female battalion and the journalist embedded in their ranks

The initial Cannes lineups have arrived with films from their semi-typical list of famous international auteurs. Cannes has had problems leaning into super-male lineups (even when hugely acclaimed female directors are available) so it's worth noting that three of the first seventeen films announced in competition are from female filmmakers: Lebanon's Nadine Labaki, Italy's Alice Rohrwacher, and France's Eva Husson.

Which films are you most excited about? We've got the titles as well as a few details we could find about them after the jump...

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Cannes News: Everbody Knows, The Poster Unveils, and Netflix Whines

It's still wintry here in NYC (groan) but Spring technically arrived a little while ago which means that the Cannes film festival is right around the corner. Here are three pieces of news involving the festival which will run from May 8th to May 19th.

The Poster
This year's poster, pictured above, is a quad rather than a horizontal for some reason. Usually they come in both formats or are just horizontal. It's based on the work of stills photographer Georges Pierre and the Jean Luc Godard film Pierrot Le Fou (1965). That's two posters based on Godard films in fairly quick succession. Last year's poster featured 1960s Italian sex symbol Claudia Cardinale but the year before that the poster was in tribute to Jean-Luc Godard's Contempt (1963)! 'Maybe Cannes ought to look beyond the 1960s and Godard sometime soon?,' he suggested with ribbing affection. 

Opening Night film and the Netflix controversy after the jump...

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Berlinale 2018: Isle of Dogs and more...

Seán McGovern reporting from the 68th Berlin International Film Festival.

There's a friendly kind of brusqueness to Berliners. They're very unbothered. But the barely-contained excitement of my first Berlinale is almost matched by the huge passion the Germans have for film culture. Ten days and dozens of stunning venues. I'm here mainly to see all the films up for the Teddy Award but it wouldn't be a film festival if I wasn't in at least three screenings a day.

Opening Film
Isle of Dogs (dir. Wes Anderson, United Kingdom/Germany)

At first it seems like a basic choice – A famed US director with a star studded cast.

But take a moment to appreciate that Isle of Dogs is a multi-format animation, in dual languages, and about a historic animosity between humans and dogs, set in Japan, in the future. It's is a gorgeous testament to the kind of storytelling animation is capable of...

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Cate Blanchett only the 9th Actress to Preside over Cannes!

by Nathaniel R

Pedro Almodóvar was always going to be a tough act to follow. So surprise, Cannes went with an actress instead of a director to head its 71st annual event (May 8th through 19th, 2018). We're sure Pedro would approve, being the big Actressexual that he is. Actresses are more common than actors for this honor but the bulk of the Main Competition jury presidents are famous auteurs. Cate the Great will only be the 9th actress to preside (for the tenth such occurence). She's also only the second Australian after director George Miller reigned in 2016.

The only actresses to have previously presided over the main Cannes jury

• Olivia de Havilland (UK) in 1965
• Sophia Loren (Italy) in 1966
• Michele Morgan (France) in 1971
• Ingrid Bergman (Sweden) in 1973
• Jeanne Moreau (France) in 1975 and 1995
• Isabelle Adjani (France) in 1997
• Liv Ullman (Norway) in 2001
• Isabelle Huppert (France) in 2009

This is a smart move on Cannes part given the criticism they often receive about their exclusionary nature. Now if they could only address that problem within their actual lineup. Other A list festivals have definitely made greater strides about including female directors in their competitive lineups. At Cannes they're still often relegated to "Un Certain Regard" or whatnot.

Sundance Primer: The 2018 Dramatic Competition Lineup

It's a wonderful week for diversity! In the festival world, at least. The American and International Dramatic Competition lineup for the 2018 Sundance Film Festival was announced and it includes narratives representing people of all kinds from all over the world. This year's lineup also features exciting film directorial debuts from familiar (Idris Elba! Paul Dano!) and new visionaries.

In the past, major films like Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire and this year's awards darling Call Me By Your Name premiered under this category. Check out this year's contenders to gauge who critics and audiences will still be talking about months after the festival's run.

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