Cannes Diary – Day 9

As we enter the home stretch you’d be forgiven for thinking the best had been and gone, the headlines had been written and the pictures had bee taken. Surely even the jury has made up their minds by now; wasn’t that Isabelle Huppert sailing away on that enormous yacht…?

Michael Haneke's THE WHITE RIBBON

…Of course not. Let us not forget that last year’s Palme d’Or winner didn’t surface until the final Saturday. Watching the THE CLASS so late in the festival was like being handed back the sweet trolley after you’ve paid the bill. Today’s dessert was THE WHITE RIBBON (see previous post). Although incredibly rich and undoubtedly stimulating, there is very little that’s sweet about Michael Haneke’s consummate return to form.

ALTIPLANO is a genuine festival curiosity, and not an entirely unpleasant one. Like a number of films in Cannes this year, this Belgian-German-Dutch co-production attempts to engage with contemporary affairs, offering a lyrical and probing portrayal of our divided but inextricably linked world. The film is undeniably stunning to look at and prompts an interesting debate about the clash between tradition and modernity.

Two Directors’ Fortnight films today. Enormous queues to get into Malaysian drama KARAOKE were swiftly followed by a steady stream of early departures, although the film was met with a seemingly enthusiastic reception from those that stayed the course. CARCASSES, a plot-free, scrapyard-set oddity from Quebec, proved strangely compulsive viewing and managed to hold its audience.

Picturehouse Top Five

1. THE WHITE RIBBON
2. PRECIOUS
3. A PROPHET
4. INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS
5. POLICE, ADJECTIVE