Cannes Jury: Almodóvar, Chastain, Fan Bingbing, and more...

The complete jury for the 70th annual Cannes Film Festival has been announced. As previously noted, Pedro Almodóvar will preside over the jury. To celebrate, The Film Experience will have "Almodóvar Week" from May 9th through the 15th so catch up with a few of his movies you've always wanted to see. We are currently planning to hit the following pictures in some capacity: Pepi Luci Bom, Dark Habits, What Have I Done to Deserve This?, All About My Mother, Volver, All About My Mother, and The Skin I Live In... though there might be alterations in that schedule or additions. 

But, yes, the Cannes jury. They are...

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Tribeca 2017: "Abundant Acreage Available"

Nathaniel R reporting from the Tribeca Film Festival

It's been 10 years since Amy Ryan broke through to "prestigious character actress" fame, whilst nabbing herself an Oscar nomination and critical hosannas for Gone Baby Gone (2017). In the years intervening, it's been fairly obvious that Hollywood didn't know what to do with her thereafter, often casting her in less than challenging roles as sympathetic wives (think Win Win or Bridge of Spies) or ex-wives (think Birdman). But she's finally no one's wife in the humble drama Abundant Acreage Available, and that lack of 'belonging to' is both writer/director Angus Maclachlan's (best known for the screenplay to the wonderful Junebug, 2005) and Ryan's own secret weapon, giving the movie its most appealing frictions...

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Tribeca 2017: Guillaume & Marion in "Rock'n Roll"

Here's Jason Adams reporting from the Tribeca Film Festival

As the fifth movie I saw in a single day at the Tribeca Film Festival this past weekend (a new personal record!) I couldn’t have chosen wiser – Guilluame Canet’s movie star satire Rock'n Roll is as broad and goofy and absurd as they come, and while it might overstay its welcome (I’d say no comedy should run over two hours but Toni Erdmann did recently prove that golden rule incorrect) it’s also a lively good-natured farce that had the audience half rolling in the aisles. 

Canet co-wrote and directed Rock'n Roll, and he stars as Guillaume Canet, famous French actor and director, partnered with and father to the child of Marion Cotillard, world-famous Oscar winning actress – the two actors (and a troupe of famous French faces that they enlist to star alongside them and fill out their world) all send up their own images, taking them to absurd (and man does it go there) extremes...

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Tribeca 2017: Super Dark Times

by Jason Adams

There was this boy named Donnie that was a year below me in High School that I was in love with in that way teenagers are always in love with impossible things. He was a wrestler in the mold of the an Apollo statue, and he was correspondingly popular – even though he was a year younger than me he hung out with the popular kids in my class, and all of them together had it in common that they had no time for the likes of me. I used to go to wrestling meets just to watch him – I’d skulk in the bleachers, trying not to be noticed, as he sauntered, full singlet, in spotlights. I heard a few years after graduation that Donnie was killed in a car accident – it’s likely he and I never spoke, but when I think of High School, I still think of him.

Stylish and moody and deeply sad, Super Dark Times brought back rushes of memories like this – of high school tinged through black times; youth and beauty all muffled and dark...

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Cannes Line Up

by Nathaniel R

The Cannes lineup was announced very early this morning (time differences, don'cha know) and we're here to give you details, not just film titles. While TFE doesn't attend ($) we do follow from afar and hope to make the trek some day. The 70th Annual Cannes Film Festival runs May 17th through May 28th.

OPENING NIGHT

Which is a high profile gig but also risky as the knives are often out for a sacrifice to the festival gods to launch the cinextravaganza. 

Ismael’s Ghosts (Arnaud Desplechin)
French auteur Desplechin's latest will be released in the US by Magnolia. It stars French A-Listers Marion Cotillard, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Mathieu Amalric, and Louis Garrel and revolves around a filmmaker (Amalric) working on a new picture when his long dead lover Carlotta (Cotillard) returns to life sending his life into a tailspin. If you've never seen Desplechin classics Kings and Queen (2004) and A Christmas Tale (2008) get right to that!

THE COMPETITION LINEUP...

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