Happy Cannesiversary to "Dheepan"
Tuesday, May 13, 2025 at 8:00AM 
by Nick Taylor
Hello, TFE readers! If you're like me, you'll be sitting out Cannes this year, using the time to read press coverage or finally see that one thing you've been meaning to watch while others swan across the croisette, conduct interviews, and shill merch for Troma Studios. I'll be spending the 78th Cannes Film Festival and the site's 10|25|50|75|100 series to visit ceremonies of years past, making new friends and revisiting familiar faces. To kick things off, we'll be spending the next few days with some Palme d'Or winners!
Some of you might remember I did not particularly like Emilia Pérez, last year’s genre-explosive musical about a cartel leader striving to reconnect with their family after getting gender-affirming care, as facilitated by her lawyer/hostage/business partner. I will not linger on that mess too much, but there’s a nub to the discourse about Jacques Audiard’s failure to meaningfully engage with any aspect of Mexican culture I did have a problem with. Namely, the idea that him being a cis white French man means he’s inherently incapable of having anything to say about someone who falls outside any of those identity markers. Yes, we can and should discuss if the French as a nation are capable of empathy, but I don’t believe artists cannot and should not make art about people outside their demographics and lived experience . . . .