Cannes is nothing if not traditional, and this year returned to its newest, grimmest annual tradition: the statement of solidarity with the Ukrainian cause. A short film was shown about the outrage of kidnapping and “Russifying” Ukrainian children from captured territories.
As so often, the festival featured its big names, its silverback gorillas and its favoured blue-chip directors, although it annoyed many who couldn’t be included in the club itself: the main competition list. But it wasn’t such a great festival for the Depp family. Johnny was roundly mocked for his torpid, waxy portrayal of Louis XV in Maïwenn’s Jeanne Du Barry and his daughter, Lily-Rose Depp, got an awful panning for her TV series The Idol.
On the other hand, the much-imitated Wes Anderson is adored by Cannes and his new film Asteroid City played very well, and might even have widened the fanbase a little. Turkish auteur Nuri Bilge Ceylan made a garrulous, ruminative, humane movie in About Dry Grasses. Aki Kaurismaki’s deadpan comedy Fallen Leaves was joyfully hugged by Cannes festivalgoers to their collective soul. Veteran Marco Bellocchio made a terrific drama about antisemitism in Kidnapped. Ken Loach made another heartfelt movie about inequality and injustice in The Old Oak. Even the late Jean-Luc Godard was included by virtue of showing for the first time his Drôle de Guerre, the trailer for a film which will never get made. But the legendary Spanish director Victor Erice, making his first film for over 30 years with his enigmatic drama Close Your Eyes, was publicly furious not to be included in the competition.
In summary though, the competition selection was very good, with some outstanding movies. All of Cannes is buzzing about Jonathan Glazer’s icily brilliant and very disturbing Holocaust drama The Zone of Interest, based on the novel by Martin Amis, who very sadly died before he could be aware of this triumph. Did Amis ever get a chance to see the finished film? Let’s hope so. Justine Triet’s courtroom murder drama Anatomy of a Fall was a terrifically tense movie, reminding me of Billy Wilder’s Witness for the Prosecution. Alice Rohrwacher has made a glorious film starring Josh O’Connor as an archaeologist-turned-ancient-grave-robber. Jude Law stole the show with his roistering turn as Henry VIII in the Tudor intrigue drama Firebrand, opposite Alicia Vikander’s Catherine Parr – although many of us wondered if he had used a buttock stunt double for one particularly gruesome sex scene. Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Monster was a marvellously complex and intricate piece of work, Ramata-Toulaye Sy’s Banel e Adama was a visually wonderful film about love and – not actually competing for the Palme d’Or – Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon was a resoundingly tragic drama about the erasure of the Native Americans from the US.
So here are my (infallible) Cannes prize predictions, the films that I think will probably will win, together with a Cannes edition of my yearly “Braddies” – for Cannes prize categories that don’t exist, but should.
Palme d’Or The Zone of Interest (dir. Jonathan Glazer)
Grand Prix La Chimera (dir. Alice Rohrwacher)
Jury prize Anatomy of a Fall (dir. Justine Triet)
Best director Wang Bing, Youth
Best screenplay Aki Kaurismäki, Fallen Leaves
Best actor Jude Law, Firebrand
Best actress Sandra Hüller for Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest
Braddies for Cannes prize categories that don’t exist:
Best supporting actor Paolo Pierobon, Kidnapped
Best supporting actress Merve Dizdar, About Dry Grasses
Best cinematography Amine Berrada for Banel & Adama
Best production design Adam Stockhausen for Asteroid City
