For the first time in years, all major Hollywood studios are sitting out the 79th Cannes Film Festival’s competition lineup.
CANNES, France — The 79th Cannes Film Festival opened its doors this week under a conspicuous cloud of Hollywood absence, with none of the summer’s most anticipated studio blockbusters making the trip to the Côte d’Azur. Christopher Nolan’s sweeping Greek epic “The Odyssey,” Steven Spielberg’s UFO thriller “Disclosure Day,” and Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Tom Cruise vehicle “Digger” have all passed on the Croisette, leaving the Main Competition to be dominated by international auteurs.
In their place, a formidable slate of world cinema heavyweights has stepped up. Romanian master Cristian Mungiu brings “Fjord,” starring Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve; Polish director Paweł Pawlikowski returns with “Fatherland,” featuring Sandra Hüller; Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda debuts “Sheep In The Box”; and Asghar Farhadi presents “Parallel Tales,” starring Isabelle Huppert. Nicolas Winding Refn’s incendiary “Her Private Hell” rounds out a competition stacked with challenging, director-driven work.
The most buzzed-about competition entry may well be James Gray’s “Paper Tiger,” a crime drama that reunites Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, and Miles Teller as two brothers pulled into a dangerous Russian mafia scheme. Neon, which has won the Palme d’Or for a record six consecutive years, is betting heavily on the film, along with Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s “All of a Sudden” and Na Hong-jin’s “Hope” as part of a nine-film festival presence.
Presiding over the competition jury is South Korean director Park Chan-wook, whose film “Oldboy” won the Grand Prix at Cannes back in 2004. Joining him are American actress Demi Moore, Chinese-born director Chloé Zhao, and Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård, among others.
In a significant milestone for the festival’s ceremonial program, both director Peter Jackson and entertainer Barbra Streisand will receive Honorary Palmes d’Or for their lifetime contributions to cinema. Jackson, whose Lord of the Rings trilogy famously previewed at Cannes in 2001, and Streisand, an EGOT winner with a career spanning six decades, will be feted during the festival’s opening ceremony.
The opening night film is Pierre Salvadori’s “The Electric Kiss,” a French-language period romantic comedy-drama about a grieving painter who attempts to contact his late wife through a psychic medium — a fittingly Gallic choice to kick off proceedings.
Industry veterans attending the festival’s parallel market, which runs May 12–20, are cautiously optimistic about deal flow despite the absence of marquee studio product. “The market overall is stronger than it was a year ago, but it’s driven by the films that work,” said Kent Sanderson, CEO of Bleecker Street Media. “And the films that don’t work, really don’t work.”
Buzzy market packages drawing early attention include Jason Statham’s “John Doe,” the latest collaboration between the star and director David Ayer, as well as a prestige drama titled “A Woman in the Sun” featuring Oscar winners Renée Zellweger and Sissy Spacek, and WWII thriller “The Passenger,” pairing Jeremy Strong with director Magnus von Horn. A dearth of Hollywood blockbusters will also prompt the festival to celebrate the 25th anniversary of “The Fast and the Furious” with original cast members including Vin Diesel in attendance.
