My 62nd Annual Cannes Picks

Today is the sixth day of this year's festival and the south of France is booming with stars out and about along the French Riviera. Some interesting movies have been nominated this year, a few in particular that seem to have caught my attention.

Lars von Trier seems to be the most talked about Director this year for his film Antichrist; which is nominated for the Golden Palm award. It stars Willem Dafoe (the Green Goblin from Spiderman) and Charlotte Gainsbourg (who had a small part in 21 Grams); posing above with von Trier at the Cannes photocall.

The film is about a grieving couple who retreat to their cabin in the woods, hoping to repair their marriage after suffering the loss of their only child. The film itself is said to be quite gruesome, involving extremely graphic and disturbing images.

Roger Ebert says von Trier's film goes beyond malevolence and into the monstrous:

"It is an audacious spit in the eye of society. It says we harbor an undreamed-of
capacity for evil. It transforms a psychological treatment into torture
undreamed of in the dungeons of history. Torturers might have been capable of
such actions, but they would have lacked the imagination. Von Trier is not so
much making a film about violence as making a film to inflict violence upon us,
perhaps as a salutary experience."

Here's what von Trier had to say about the film on the festival's website:

"Two years ago, I suffered from a depression. It was a new experience for me. Everything, no matter what, seemed unimportant, trivial. I couldn't work. Six months later, just as an exercise, I wrote a script… The work on the script did not follow my usual modus operandi. Scenes were added for no reason. Images were composed free of logic or dramatic thinking. They often came from dreams I was having at the time, or dreams I’d had earlier in my life. Once again the subject was “Nature”, but in a different and more direct way than before. In a more personal way… In any case, I can offer no excuse for Antichrist. Other than my absolute belief in the film – the most important film of my entire career!"

Another official selection that I can't wait to see is Taking Woodstock by Ang Lee. The story is set in 1969, about a homosexual interior designer who moves home to help his parents fix up their suffering motel in White Lake, New York. When a neighbouring town pulls the permit on a hippie music festival, he decides to hold the show to get some business for the motel. Turns out that half a million people show up for the generation-defining experience that changed pop culture forever. Lee focuses on Elliot's story rather than trying to recreate the epic performances. My father went to Woodstock, and I've been living vicariously through him ever since I could. I'm thinking I'll bring him along to see this one - I can't wait!!