Christoph Waltz Gives an Award for a Change

<--- Oh look. Christoph Waltz, finally tiring of receving awards for Inglourious Basterds, is now giving them out. There he is (left) giving Best Actress to barefoot Sibel Kekilli at Germany's Oscars "The Lolas". I've never seen anyone accepting a Best Actress trophy while barefoot before but I hope to see someone do so sometime real soon.

If you've never heard the name Sibel Kekilli before, please do yourself a favor and rent Fatih Akin's erotic drama Head On (aka Gegen die Wand) She's got thunderclap force in that movie.
The Winners
Picture (Silver), Editing & Score: Hans-Christian Schmid's Storm, a war crime drama
Picture (Bronze) & Actress: When We Leave starring Sibel Kekilli
Supporting Actor: Justus von Dohnnanyi in Men in the City.
Children's Film: Lena Olbrich & Christian Becker's Vorstadtkrokodile which translates to something like Suburban Crocodiles
Documentary: Ernst Ludwig Ganzert and Ulli Pfau's The Heart of Jenin about a Palestinian father who donates his son's organs to Israeli children even though his son was killed by Israeli soldiers.
Lifetime Achievement: writer/producer Bernd Eichinger

But the night's big winner was The White Ribbon

Picture (Gold), Director, Screenplay, Actor (Burghart Klaussner, "The Pastor"), Supporting Actress (Maria-Victoria Dragus, "Klara"), Cinematography, Costumes, Art Direction, Makeup & Sound: Ten (that's right, ten!) statues went to Michael Haneke's Oscar nominee. That's a record. The previous Lola champ (winning nine) was the wonderful Goodbye Lenin! (2003) starring Daniel Brühl which had, like The White Ribbon after it, a very successful run in the international marketplace.

I was surprised to read the Supporting Actress winner. The White Ribbon had many fine small performances but the statue winner was neither the abused daughter (Roxane Duran) nor the humiliated midwife (Susanne Lothar, who was nominated as Best Actress instead). It also wasn't the teacher's sweet girlfriend (Leonie Benesch) or the rich baroness (Ursina Lardi). The winner was the manipulative leader of that creepy flock of school children that may be sabotaging everyone in town. "Forgive us Father."

Back to Sibel to wrap up. We've also never seen a Best Actress Oscar winner sit down on stage after winning. For all their 'I'm going to faint/cry' affectations, nobody actually collapses!

Modern Maestros: Michael Haneke

Robert here, continuing my series on great contemporary directors.  I thought I’d stay overseas this week and feature a somewhat daunting European presence.

Maestro: Michael Haneke
Known For: difficult movies about human treacherousness and the breakdown of society.
Influences: Imagine the love-child of Robert Bresson and Franz Kafka.  Then again, maybe don’t.
Masterpieces: The White Ribbon and Caché
Disasters: Not sure why Funny Games worked reasonably well in Europe but was a real misfire in it's American version.  But it was.
Better than you remember: Let’s put it this way.  If you remember a Haneke film as being bad because it was unpleasant, then it was probably better than you remember.
Awards: Nothing from the establishment, expectedly.  But they love him in Europe, giving him the Palme d’Or for The White Ribbon and Best Director for Caché and the same for both films at the European Film Awards.
Box Office: Over 3 million dollars for Caché.
Favorite Actor: German actress Susanne Lothar has appeared in four films: The Piano Teacher, The White Ribbon, The Castle, and Funny Games, beating out better known stars such as Juliette Binoche or Isabelle Huppert (2 each)

The word provocateur.  Someone who provokes.  Michael Haneke fits the definition to be sure.  Sadly, all too often he gets grouped in with a large collective of European filmmakers whose provocation is their calling card.  Director's like Lars von Trier, Gaspar Noe, Catherine Breillat and more who make films that are routinely unbearable (in a good way).  And while it's unfortunate that all of them are grouped so generically (as many of them are great), I feel that Haneke perhaps deserves it the least.  So how can I claim that a man who was once quoted saying "I'm trying to rape the viewer into independence." Isn't a mere outrage-monger?  Consider the previous part of that quote as his opinion on the medium "I’ve been accused of ‘raping’ the audience in my films, and I admit to that freely — all movies assault the viewer in one way or another."  Haneke believe that all films influence and manipulate the audience, whether that be with suggestions about gender politics, love's ability to conquer all, or the usefulness of violence to achieve a goal.  Hollywood movies that sell themselves as nothing more than fun entertainment are most dangerous as they anesthetize the viewer while still suggesting a form of reality.  Haneke speaks out against the concept of the popcorn movie more than almost anyone, because most of all he wants you, the viewer, to think.

Not that other provocateurs don't want you to think.  But first they want you to feel shock, or discomfort or visceral horror as a jumping off point to thought.  Haneke, much like Bresson before him, wants to be an unbiased observer (something that he himself will admit is impossible and something he toys with in Funny Games).  And because we're observing the events with such impersonal distance the shocking moments that unfold pack even more of an impact.  To put it another way: in terms of accessibility most films meet us more than half way, whether they're peddling Hollywood entertainment or artistic provocation.  Haneke's films ask us to do the work, to make the effort toward understanding what we're seeing.  When forced to make that kind of investment in a movie, how could it not affect us more?  Consider the ending of The Piano Teacher (which I will not give away, but can be seen here (without English subtitles)).  It is a shocking moment indeed.  But what makes it shocking?  Certainly not because we've come to truly like Isabelle Huppert's distant, unkind character.  Not because we pity her either.  And while the moment is certainly surprising, after spending an entire movie observing her psyche we can't claim to be too surprised.  It's our investment that's the key.  And so it is time after time, in enigmatic films like Caché, The White Ribbon and all the way back to The Seventh Continent.  We're asked to commit only to be shocked into thought.  This is what makes Michael Haneke the best kind of provocateur.

Haneke's immediate plans are unknown, but no one would blame him for taking a break, especially after completing one of the most successful films of his career (no Oscar, but then again Oscar films aren't usually described as "difficult" or "demanding").  Until his next picture, there's always the back catalog.  If you're unfamiliar with Mr. Haneke's work, there's no better time than now (notice: if you're currently experiencing depression or some kind of emotional distress, there may in fact be a better time than now).

Michael Haneke, Supreme Confounder

A mssg received from my friend 'txt critic' today.

Lincoln Plaza is the WORST! Half of my audience was literally snoring through "The White Ribbon" -- in unison! -- and one half-deaf woman bellowed an hour in, 'I THOUGHT THIS HAD TO DO WITH THE HOLOCAUST.'

I swear UWS seniors ruin more movies than anyone.

I wasn't there but I can attest to this phenomenon. You will always get a perturbed earful when you see a Haneke picture on the Upper West Side. Should we presume the AMPAS members on the foreign film nominating committee will feel just as impatient with its mysteries and its implicitly projected "25 years later..." horror? AO Scott certainly didn't boost this Cannes Winner's Oscar cause with his recent review either.

But then I'm not currently speaking to AO anyway. He disses Haneke's always provocative direction just two weeks after raving about Clint Eastwood's work on Invictus??? What a world... what a world... [argh] don't make me talk about Invictus, AO. don't make me. I can't. I can't. It's just so ham-fistedly unworthy of discussion... [argh!]
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The Oscar Race Begins on November 6th

That's just 5 days away. That's the (un)official start date. I'm declaring it. It used to be the NBR's announcement of their top ten list but with more and more awards groups clamoring to yell "first!", "first!" has lost virtually all its meaning. Or rather, it's meaning has changed. It now means "We're desperate for attention!" ...though maybe it always did. So, Nov. 6th is the day...


...since that's when a lot of folks will get their first look at Precious ["for you consideration..." in virtually every category save Best Actor and Supporting Actor. No, Lenny Kravitz's male nurse doesn't count]. That's when that particularly buzzy contenduh goes from being a movie with deafening hype and buzz (huzz? bype? hypzz?) to being a real thing, a movie audiences can react to in a less abstract, more honest and less controllable-by-campaign-and-hype way. As it should be.

[tangent] I always find it strange when people call me an elitist (I assume because I generally prefer unravelling female protagonists to superpowered men in costumes?) because I'm actually populist at heart. I demand that cinema of all types readily available to the masses! The Oscars are frustrating in this way because the type of films that matter to the Academy -- and to drama nuts like you (I assume if you're reading TFE) -- are ever more skittish about being seen, hiding in tiny little theaters in only the biggest cities, as if too many curious eyeballs would ruin their strenuous beauty.

If it were up to me you'd have to open by Christmas at the absolute latest in the top six to eight markets (something like that -- thus making you an actual release in the year in which you're asking for statues and top ten lists) instead of just Los Angeles by the 31st for a one week run on one screen. (I fail to see how such tiny in-name-only "releases" within a calendar year are any different in practice than festival showings which do not make you eligible). [/tangent]

On a smaller scale November 6th is when Best Actor contender Hal Holbrook emerges with the senior-wants-his-farm-back drama That Evening Sun. This promising debut feature from writer/director Scott Teems has other fine performances (particularly Ray McKinnon as Holbrook's nemesis) but none of the other actors have anything in the way of an Oscar-ready profile. But after the year Carrie Preston has had -- dropping some humanity into the arch Duplicity, reliably entertaining us as Arlene on True Blood and this affecting portrait of a wife who loves her husband but isn't blind to his flaws -- we should all be new fans.

Yes, from November 6th onward each and every weekend brings us new Oscar contenders of one type or another.

• Nov 6th: Precious, That Evening Sun, A Christmas Carol
• Nov 13th: Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Messenger
• Nov 20th: Broken Embraces, The Blind Side (?), The Twilight Sa (oh, I'm kidding)
• Nov 27th: The Road (wide. Holiday appropriate! er....) and a bunch of limited releases: Me and Orson Welles, The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, The Princess and the Frog. I have to say I think it was a H-U-G-E mistake for Nine to leave November... even more enormous than I had originally thought. You see, not one major Oscar contender is going to be wide for the entire Thanksgiving period. Unless you count The Road. Not even Precious (which will be expanding in November but not wide until sometime in December). It's like the Weinstein Company is just setting fire to money. They'd have had zero competition. Plus, November is actually from the latin word "novem" which means NINE. Hello... can't the Weinsteins respect the Gregorian calendar!?

• Dec 4th: Brothers, Up in the Air, Everybody's Fine (?)
• Dec 11th: A Single Man, Invictus and The Lovely Bones which is only in limited release till January. Like Nine, it's another Oscar hopeful with mainstream appeal. Plus it's from a hugely successful director (Peter Jackson). It seems like they're just putting money in the trash compactor. Why don't they want those holiday dollars? Are they worried about the movie's bankability?
  
• Dec 18th: Avatar (wide), Nine, The Young Victoria
• Christmas: Sherlock Holmes, It's Complicated (wide releases... Globe contenders?), Police Adjective (Romania's foreign film contender). Nine and Up in the Air, two presumed Oscar giants, also quit hiding and open wide.
  
• Dec 30th: The White Ribbon (More than most filmmakers, Michael Haneke pieces require time to shift and settle and unsettle again in the mind of the viewer. So why they keep sticking him with these maddeningly busy release dates -- Christmas or New Years -- is beyond me. Seems like such a missed opportunity for what his films always need: discussions with room to breathe. Caché in particular was gaining steam -- his films build the further you get away from them -- so had it been released even just a few weeks earlier (sigh) maybe it would have won a Screenplay or Director nod? Or at least more precursor honors. Instead it t'was crushed in the glut. We'll see the same thing happen again this time.
  

So longwinded today.

My point is simply this: Here we go! (Are you excited yet?)
This was all a lengthy awkward way of saying that Oscar Predictions in All Categories are all up to date and I'm more than ready for these movies. Discuss.
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LFF: Pander, Provoke, Perplex

More from the LONDON FILM FESTIVAL, where Dave had a rather dreadful day at the movies, but I've omitted tearing apart "a new Slumdog Millionaire?", Ride the Wave Johnny (which is, can you believe it, even worse than our newest Best Picture winner), and have instead finally decided to give you my (briefer than I wanted them to be) thoughts on Cannes winner The White Ribbon. But first...

Glorious 39 isn't. Glorious, that is. In fact, it's a remarkable disaster of a film, one of those that slowly goes further and further down the road of dreadful and eventually emerges at somewhere completely laughable, although I'm sure everyone involved saw the ridiculous developments as some masterstroke. Stephen Poliakoff has received critical laudings for his television work over the last decade, but there's no sign of any of that supposed quality here at all. A superb British cast, mixing promising youngsters (Romola Garai, Eddie Redmayne, and a delectably absurd Juno Temple) with seasoned performers (Julie Christie, Bill Nighy, Christopher Lee), is wasted on a story that is delivered in so hackneyed and laughable a manner that it never convinces. If you've missed ripe thriller cliches such as the message from 'beyond the grave' through a piece of film, the disembodied wails of a lost baby, or, most delightfully, our heroine becoming gothically unhinged, then maybe it is worth checking this out - it is entertaining, just in all the wrong ways. D-

Harmony Korine clearly loves his title of provocateur, for Trash Humpers is as repulsively erratic as you'd expect. However, while it slowly becomes more and more embroiled in the darkest of places with this group of elderly people - whose favoured pastime is, literally, humping trashcans - it's really less striking than it wants to be. A few moments of absurdity strike the funny bone, and a few strike the gag reflex, but mostly this is an unbearably boring piece of work, featuring actors wearing masks that make them look more like Freddy Krueger than OAPs and one with laughter so piercing I repeatedly had to stick my fingers in my ears. There's some vague point about how these people "choose to be free", all handily spelt out for us in one scene, but mostly it's an excuse for Korine to try and baffle and disturb. Instead, he merely bores. D

There's some edge taken off the clinical deconstruction usually so typical of Michael Haneke in The White Ribbon. Perhaps it's the black-and-white photography, so glowingly attractive that it's markedly different from the perverse, bare visual appeal of his other features. Perhaps it's the surprising presence of romance and acidic humour. Perhaps it's the mediation of a cypher in the uncommonly nice young schoolteacher, a inclusion that seems a bit too designed to make the audience like the film more than Haneke usually allows. Haneke's searing portrayal of the gradual undoing of a hypocritical bunch of people - in this case a small German township just before World War I - is as insidiously intriguing and deliberately constructed as ever, but ironically the attempt to make an audience more emotionally invested had the opposite effect of pushing this viewer away. The lack of conclusions, and the lack of importance in the offered solution is as effective in making the film linger as Haneke's work always is, but despite the strong ensemble work and Haneke's technical supremacy, something about the film's project feels disconnected. It doesn't quite fascinate and enthrall with the same punchy strength Haneke has made his trademark. B

This Is Not a Link Round Up

I feel like I haven't perused the internets in ages. Ages and ages. Still couldn't get to it today. I hate my life lately...

Fin de Cinema lists the 48 films shortlisted for the European Film Awards only 6 or so of which line up with the Oscar submissions for foreign language film for 2009. That's partially because the time window is different (Slumdog Millionaire and The Reader are somehow eligible) and also due to different rules. The nifty thing about their lineups -- which can't be replicated at the Oscars -- is the ability to recognize a great year one particular country is having. For instance, this year at the European Film Awards they're considering 4 German films: Everyone Else (pictured left), The White Ribbon (the Cannes winner), Jerichow, and Der Baader Meinhof Complex. The EFAs are sort of like the Oscars if you think of Europe as one country... which more people are probably starting to. Or if you think of the USA as a continent composed of many very different smaller countries ... which more people are probably starting to.

The Critical Condition has been doing this thing called the "best picture expansion project". A lot of blogs were doing similar things -- with Oscar expanding their list, let's pretend they did it long ago -- which is why I never jumped in. But that doesn't mean I don't find them fun to read. These are not 'what if's so much as what 'shoulda been's. This one is on 1989. A year near and dear to my heart on account of La Pfeiffer and her Fabulous Baker Boys.

And I highly suggest you read this chain of posts... Kim Morgan of Sunset Gun is a terrific writer and really loves Roman Polanski's touched woman classic Repulsion which sets off rather angry how-dare-she responses from people including Amanda Marcotte who takes great offense from it. Which sets off this impassioned defense piece by Eric Kuehrsten, whose writing I love and who has actually guest blogged here a couple of times.

This is so much more fun / fascinating / provocative than the typical web hissy fits that have almost zero depth and are usually only interesting in the way they display the thin skin and thick egos of the critics involved.

Foreign Film Hoopla, 60+ Oscar Submissions

In the years I've been documenting Oscar's once largely undocumented foreign film category, we've seen the number of players creep up virtually every year, despite the concurrent dwindling of foreign film distribution in the United States. In 2001 for example when I first began tracking it and sharing the info online, there were 51 official submissions for Best Foreign Language Film. Last year there were 67. For the 2009 Oscar race (the submission deadline has now passed) we've now heard from 62 countries. But that doesn't mean the official list will only be 62 films. In the eight years I've been documenting this race, something always changes between the submission deadline and Oscar's official announcement of the list (coming soon): Films are disqualified, last minute switcheroos happen, countries that didn't make noise when they first submitted are revealed. There will be drama... albeit the mostly invisible kind.

You can see more about these 62 entries (cast, posters, miscellania) on the super comprehensive charts at The Film Experience

• Albania to France
• Georgia to Morocco
• The Netherlands to Vietnam

We'll have a lot more once things are "official" but here's a few early topics to think about...

Clockwise from top left: Albania's Alive, Luxembourg's Réfractaire, Czech
Republic's Protektor, Macedonia's Wingless and Iran's About Elly

World War II Fetish
World War II is to "Best Foreign Language Film" what Disabilities are to "Best Actor" and what DeGlam is to "Best Actress" and what Longsuffering Spouse is to "Supporting Actress"; the juiciest of bait for AMPAS taste buds. So we have to suspect that the following five films have a tiny boost in the competition: Norway's Max Manus, Luxembourg's Réfractaire (with Love Songs' breakout young star Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet), the Czech Republic's Protektor, Slovakia's Broken Promise and Slovenia's Landscape No. 2 which you can actually already rent from Netflix.

The Stars
Having a recognizable face in your movie can sometimes put you on a voter's good side. They are only human and who among us isn't won over (at least initially) by the presence of a familiar well loved face? Switzerland's Home has the great Isabelle Huppert, Italy's Baaria has Raoul Bova, China's operatic biopic Forever Enthralled has Ziyi Zhang, Mexico's Backyard (see previous post) has Jimmy Smits, Argentina's The Secret in Their Eyes AND Spain's The Dancer and the Thief both star Ricardo Darin.

Clockwise from top left: China's Forever Enthralled, Switzerland's Home,
Argentina's The Secret in Their Eyes and Romania's Police, Adjective

Critical Darlings
Oscar has been rejiggering the rules in this category in a number of ways these past few years to try and curb the animosity that they often engender in the press when they skip extremely well-regarded foreign films like Romania's 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days. Critical raves and festival prizes are no guarantee but contrary to the protestations of disgruntled cinephiles, they do not hurt.

Films that already have an enviable pool of well wishers include Germany's The White Ribbon from Michael Haneke (who was invited to join the Academy two years back), France's Un Prophete, Canada's I Killed My Mother, Australia's Samson and Delilah, Greece's Dogtooth, Korea's Mother and Romania's Police, Adjective.

You can argue that some of these pictures are anti-Bait... but let's be fair: the Academy can and does surprise. Sometimes they go against their grain and embrace the violently confrontational (Mexico's Amores Perros), the unusually risque (Austria's Revanche) or the utterly alien (Finland's The Man Without a Past). Anything can happen even if Anything usually doesn't.

the submission charts
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TIFF: The Finale

Lev Lewis signing off from the Toronto International Film Festival

For ten days a year my little big city is overtaken by the masses of the film industry. Celebrities of all kinds are spotted walking casually through Yonge St.; semi-recognizable journalists with their green laniards hurry from screening to screening. A little piece of Hollywood just one streetcar ride away from me. So, it's odd to see how a city can overnight seem the centre of the world and then, just like that, retreat back to its former, seemingly dull self.

Not that I'm complaining. As exciting as the last ten days have been, a respite from line-ups and writing and, yes, even films, will be most welcome. 18 films in ten days isn't an exorbitant amount but it's more than enough for me. I'll leave you with a write-up on the best films I saw at the festival.

Now for the movies!

Un Prophète
Winner of the Grand Prix at this years Cannes, revered auteur Jacques Audiard's sprawling and gripping crime drama, A Prophet follows the ascent of a young Arab man named Malik through the political labyrinth of a French prison. Audiard and co-screenwriter Thomas Bidegain carefully avoid the trappings of the crime genre without completely subverting them, and in the process have crafted a film that pays homage to the great crime films without simple imitation. Constant motion and an unusual use of music counterbalance the film's gritty hand-held feel and lengthy running time. Grade: A-

Mother
Bong Joon-ho follows up his brilliant monster movie The Host with another look into family and the lengths parents will go to save their offspring. Mother is the story of a, what else, mother trying to get her mentally-challenged son cleared of murder. What's remarkable about Joon-ho is the way he utilizes different genres (in this case, mystery) to tackle issues of corruption, family, guilt, government etc. with careful subtlety. His deceptively simple mystery is weaved together with such ease, through a screenplay laden with a perceptive eye towards the smallest detail that the film's final conclusion is shocking yet quickly apparent. Finally, Kim Hye-ja delivers what may be the female performance of the year. Almost single-minded in her desperation for her son, Hye-ja avoids histrionics and instead creates a character of remarkable depth. Grade: A

The White Ribbon
Recalling some of the greatest work of Bergman, Michael Haneke's fully deserving Palme d'or winner The White Ribbon is a masterwork. Haneke brilliantly underpins the beginning of fascism in Europe within the context of horrific attacks upon and within a small village. His breadth of ideas and his exacting yet straightforward use of editing, cinematography and sound to create atmosphere are all applied to their fullest extent. This is an unsettling and exceptional film. Grade: A

A Note: All three of these films have been submitted by their respective countries for the Academy Awards. If the Oscars have any sense all three will be nominated.

Films, Ranked
1. Antichrist (A)
2. The White Ribbon (A)
3. Mother (A)
4. A Prophet (A-)
5. Fish Tank (A-)
6. Bad Lieuteant: Port of Call New Orleans (B+)
7. Dogtooth(B+)
8. Police, Adjective (B)
9. White Material (B-)
10. Les Herbes Folles (B-)
11. A Serious Man (B-)
12. Mr. Nobody (B-)
13. Up In the Air (C+)
14. Jennifer's Body (C-)
15. My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (C-)
16. Get Low (D+)
17. Life During Wartime (D+)
18. Glorious 39 (D)


Best Director
Lars von Trier, Antichrist (Michael Haneke, The White Ribbon and Bong Joon-ho, Mother)
Best Actor
Willem Dafoe, Antichrist (Nicolas Cage, The Bad Lieutenant...)
Best Actress
Kim Hye-ja, Mother (Charlotte Gainsbourg, Antichrist)

Best Supporting Actor
<--- Michael Fassbender, Fish Tank (Niels Arestrup, Un Prophete and Richard Kind, A Serious Man)
Best Supporting Actress
Roxanne Duran, The White Ribbon (Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air and Juno Temple, Mr. Nobody)
Best Ensemble
The White Ribbon (Fish Tank)
Best Screenplay
Michael Haneke, The White Ribbon (Lars Von Trier, Antichrist and Park Eun-kyo, Mother)
Best Cinematography
Thimios Bakatatakis, Dogtooth (Hong Kyung-pyo, Mother and Anthony Dod Mantle, Antichrist)
Best Original Score
Lee Byeong-Woo, Mother (Stuart Staples, White Material)

Thanks so much for reading and Nathaniel for giving me the space to have some of my writing read. Perhaps I'll see you next year.

Cannes Winners for 2009

OFFICIAL COMPETITION
Jury president was French actress, deity, provocateur Isabelle Huppert
Palme D'or: The White Ribbon by Michael Haneke. Cannes loves him long time. And so does Isabelle Huppert, his La Pianiste leading lady. Sony Pictures Classics has US distribution rights to this black and white costume drama about German village and school prior to World War I. It sounds like something of a departure for Haneke since his films are usually contemporary and often tightly focused on small casts. The extensive German voiceover will be rerecorded in English for that release.

Michael Haneke nabs the top prize

Grand Prix: Un Prophète by Jacques Audiard. Sony Pictures Classics also has this one -- winner and runner up prepping for release? Not bad, SPC, not bad.
Jury Prize: It was a tie between the family drama Fish Tank by Andrea Arnold and vampire drama Thirst from Oldboy director Park Chan-Wook

Special Jury Prize: Director Alain Resnais won this special prize for Wild Grass. He's 86 and he's still making movies. His most famous film is probably Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) but, rather incredibly, he's never had a film nominated for Oscar's foreign language race and he's only had won prize winner at Cannes, Mon Oncle d'Amérique (1980)
Best Director: Brillante Mendoza competed last year with Serbis and for this prolific Pinoy director, the second time is the charm. He won the prize for his violent drama Kinatay. This award will cause a ruckus. Many people detested the film, including Roger Ebert who declared it the worst in Cannes history.


Best Actress Charlotte Gainsbourgh for Lars Von Trier's Antichrist. This film just keeps adding fuel to its media fire. Well done Lars and your latest actress victim. You continue a grand tradition.
Best Actor Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds (see previous post for Rosengje's very similar enthusiasm)
Best Screenplay Feng Mei won for writing Lou Ye's explicit gay romantic drama Spring Fever
Palme D'Or (Short Film): Arena by Joao Salaviza

CAMERA D'OR
This award goes to the best first film. Warwick Thornton's buzzy Australian feature Samson and Delilah (pictured right) took the prize. He's previously made three short films. Special Mention went to Ajami by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani

FIPRESCI
Competition: The White Ribbon by Michael Haneke
Un Certain Regard: Police, Adjective by Corneliu Porumboiu
Directors Fortnight: Amreeka by Cherien Dabis

UN CERTAIN REGARD
Jury president was Italian writer/director Paolo Sorrentino
Prize: Dogtooth by Yorgos Lanthimos. The synopsis sounds vaguely Virgin Suicides-ish, three teens are cut off from the outside world by their parents.
Jury Prize: Police, Adjective
Two Special Prizes: Father of My Children by Mia Hansen-Love and No One Knows About the Persian Cats by Bahman Ghobadi

CRITICS WEEK
Grand Prix: Goodbye Gary by Nassim Amaouche
SACD Prize: Lost Persons Area by Caroline Strubbe
Cash Prize, Young Critic Award and Regards Jeunes Prize: Whisper in the Wind by Shahram Alidi
Canal Plus Grand Prix (Short Film): Seeds of the Fall by Patrick Eklund
Kodak Discovery (Short Film): Logorama by Francois Alaux, Herve de Crecy and Ludovic Houplain

DIRECTORS FORTNIGHT
Art Cinema, 7e Prix Regars Jeunes and the SACD Prize: Twenty year-old (!) actor Xavier Dolan-Tadros ' (pictured right) won an incredible three prizes for his directorial debut, a coming out mother-son drama called I Killed My Mother (J'ai Tue Ma Mere)
Special Mention: La Merditude des Choses by Felix van Groeningen
Europa Cinemas Label: La Pivellina by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel
French short film: Montparnasse

THE SNUBBED
Whether you're in the main competition or outside of it in the sidebars, when reaction is very positive the snubs have to sting. The following films won coveted buzz but no hardware: Lee Daniel's Oscar hopeful Precious, Marco Bellochio's Vincere and Jane Campion's Bright Star.

FURTHER READING
Indie Wire live blogged the event. Time Warner Cable of New York wanted me to pay $9.95 per month for the French language station so sadly I couldn't gaze at Huppert and her fire-starter jury myself.

More From Cannes: Imelda, Penélope, Brad, Palme D'Or Frontrunners

I'm so far behind on the Cannes coverage! The festival wraps on Sunday. So, without further ado some red carpet beauties and some links to get you caught up if you haven't been online much or were trusting me to bring you the best bits ...so sorry to have kept you waiting.


First up is Imelda Staunton at the photocall for Ang Lee's Taking Woodstock. There was some very very early Oscar buzz for Imelda for her comic portrayal of Dimitri Martin's mom. Rosengje wasn't sold, writing...

I think people are going to be very divided about Imelda Staunton. It was a technically perfect performance and likely imitated the real life counterpart, but the character is written as too much of a caricature. Excluding one great scene involving some.. special brownies she is excessively shrill.

Saïd Taghmaoui, all in white, attended the Vengeance premiere. I feel like I haven't seen him in a movie in forever but I like him. Next up for Saïd is G.I. Joe: The Rise of the Cobra. Kristin Scott Thomas remains a classy red carpet must have. Michelle Yeoh and Kerry Washington, two undervalued actresses that we've always loved here at the Experience, have both been valiantly working the charity circuit at Cannes.

Kerry's getting muscled out of this picture by Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie, mega-stars (heyyyy, just like she was in Mr. & Mrs. Smith. You're entirely forgiven if you didn't realize Kerry was in that movie. She barely is). Brad was in Cannes for Inglourious Basterds which seems to have a left a lot of people underwhelmed.

All Cannes! All the Time!
Go Fug Yourself salutes Penélope's game face after her food poisoning this week.
Eating the Sun Lots of Philippines upset abotu Roger Ebert's 'worst film ever' comments about Brillant Mendoza's Kinatay
IndieWire on why Cannes still matters
Living in Cinema is jazzed for the new Tsai Ming-Liang film Face. The early stills and the trailer do look like pure eye candy.
NY Post Did you know that Antichrist's end credits cite a "misogyny consultant" Ha! Lars Von Trier continually delights me... and I don't even need to see his movies (not that I don't -- love them, too) for this delight to take place. But then, I've always had a thing for artists who loved to push buttons just to be pushing them and/or to mock themselves or have fun with perceptions of their persona. Madonna used to be in this camp, too.
Twitch rumor has it: Universal is going to ask Tarantino to trim Inglourious Basterds down after the mixed reaction at Cannes. Hey, a little trim probably wouldn't hurt most QT movies.
Getty points to the trend for the red carpet at Cannes and elsewhere: nude (coloring that is)
Obsessed With Film enthusiastically offers 5 reasons to see Sam Raimi's Drag Me to Hell
IndieWire Director's Fortnight winners... a big night for the Quebecois film I Killed My Mother
My New Plaid Pants is waiting impatiently for each new bit on Michael Haneke's The White Ribbon
Risky Business thinks that Haneke's film is going to win the Palme D'Or.

Will these two films be the big winners?

As to who might win... Haneke seems like a good bet but it's not the only film that's been wowing them. Others are saying Jacques Audiard's Un Prophete could take it. (If you don't recognize the name just think of the lively, tense French hits The Beat That My Heart Skipped and Read My Lips... both of which did well in their US runs). But remember Cannes watchers... no one knows anything. The winners are never exactly predictable. This ain't the Oscars. It's a juried competition where they're encouraged to spread the wealth. No one knows who might win what... except maybe Isabelle Huppert.
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