Even ‘The Best’ can’t beat ‘Thor’

As the only new movie opening in wide release this weekend, The Best Man Holiday is expected to make a strong debut. But one’s “strength” is, of course, relative when compared to that of a towheaded Norse god. If the Taye Diggs romantic dramedy is in fact the cinema’s best man, then Thor: The Dark World is the bridegroom, the main attraction. The two sequels (The Best Man opened back in 1999) will go head-to-head over the next several days, though it won’t be much of a bout. The Dark World is poised to reap $35 million or so, while Holiday is tracking in the mid $20-million range. Still, the latter is expected to out-perform the brand’s first installment. The Best Man opened to a modest $9 million 14 years ago, accumulating $34 million by the end of its run. (Adjusted for inflation, that number is roughly $54 million.) Holiday is also trending strong among African American women, the same demographic that helped last spring’s Think Like A Man debut to over $33 million. Perhaps they’ll ensure Thor wins the weekend by a smaller margin than predicted.

The Best Man Holiday wasn’t always the lone wide release scheduled to open over the weekend of November 15th, however. As of early October, The Book Thief and Scorsese’s eagerly anticipated The Wolf of Wall Street were also slated to bow tonight. But Fox soon changed its mind about the best Book Thief release strategy, and opted for a platform approach beginning last weekend instead. And Wolf of Wall Street was running a little long for its studio’s comfort. Rumors had been circulating for some time that Scorsese wouldn’t have a suitable cut finished in time for tonight. By the end of the month it was clear that he wouldn’t, and now Wolf has been pushed back to Christmas Day. If others had been pondering an 11/15 rollout, they (wisely) thought better of sandwiching themselves between blockbuster Thor and international phenom The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, which opens next Friday. Hence, The Best Man’s single status.


The specialty market will offer up its own version of a major release in the form of Alexander Payne’s (The Descendants) Nebraska, opening in four locations tonight. Bruce Dern won the Best Actor award at the Cannes Film Festival for his turn as an aging alcoholic convinced he’s won a million dollars. Between the director’s clout, the Cannes buzz, and the film’s generally favorable reviews (89% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes), Nebraska is expected to average $40,000 per theatre.

Dallas Buyers Club expands again, this time to 184 locations. Most likely, it’ll earn over $1 million.

And then next weekend, nothing else going on anywhere or doing anything will matter, because The Hunger Games will have arrived. Simply put, the odds are in no one else’s favor.

Latest 'Jackass' looks to unseat 'Gravity'

Jackass spinoff Bad Grandpa may finally have the popular heft to unseat Gravity this weekend, bringing the latter’s nearly month-long reign over the box office to a worthy end. It’s been quite a run for Alfonso Cuaron and co.: Gravity has earned $177 million domestically and close to $300 million worldwide. Business this weekend is expected to remain steady, if no longer stellar. Pundits predict a haul in the mid $20 million range, which would amount to a 25% downturn in sales.

Bad Grandpa, on the other hand, is reportedly on track to double its production value. The Borat-style comedy, in which Johnny Knoxville plays the titular geriatric pervert on an eventful roadtrip with his chip-off-the-ole’-block troublemaker grandson, was produced for approximately $15 million. Odds are the Jackass faithful will help carry the film to a $30 million opening weekend. As respectable a figure as that may sound, however, it nonetheless pales in comparison with the franchise’s last debut. Jackass: 3D , released in 2010, was buoyed by expensive 3D sales to earn a whopping $50 million its first weekend out of the gate (or should we say pen?).

Ridley Scott/Cormac McCarthy collaboration The Counselor, also bowing tonight, certainly has a fancier pedigree to its name, but the critical drubbing it’s received will most likely undercut its ability to perform, and certainly compete with wide-appeal Grandpa. Our Rex Roberts didn’t completely pan the film that attracted the likes of megawatt stars Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender, Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz, and Cameron Diaz, but neither did he place himself in the minority of lauders. “The Counselor isn’t a bad movie,” he wrote, “just a bombastic one.” Audiences aren’t expected to bang down the doors in their haste to view this exhibition of hubris (on multiple levels). Fox believes the movie will earn between $8 and $10 million.

On the other end of the critical spectrum, French film and Cannes Palme d’Or winner Blue Is the Warmest Color may reap the benefits of universal praise and a healthy dose of salacious controversy. Not only does the three-hour drama about a young woman and her intense relationship with a female artist carry with it an NC-17 rating, but the film’s two leading ladies and their director have been engaged in a very public media battle over who was or was not exploited during the movie’s graphic lesbian sex scenes. The most recent installment of the he-said she-said argument/publicity gambit took the form of an open letter by director Abdellatif Kechiche, in which he charged actress Lea Seydoux with making “opportunistic calculations.” It all seems a bit juvenile for such high-brow fare, but let’s see if the nonsense helps move tickets. Blue Is the Warmest Color opens in just four theaters tonight.

12 Years A Slave expands considerably this weekend, playing in 123 theaters. After it over-performed at 19 locations last weekend the historical drama is expected to only gain momentum. Its recent Gotham Award nominations probably won’t hurt its earning potential, either.

Early Oscar 2014 predictions: best actor

With fall comes more than just a cooling of temperatures – within the film industry, the advent of chillier weather signals the heating up of that grand poobah competition, the Oscar race. This year’s crop of contenders is one of the strongest in recent memory. Already, records are being set (Alfonso Cuaron’s ‘Gravity’ pulled in the largest October opening-weekend haul to date), expectations exceeded (haven’t we already seen a million or two little-kid-gone-missing films? Not like Prisoners, we haven’t) and nerves shot (thank you, Paul Greengrass, for inducing a lingering headache after I felt compelled to hold my breath over and over again while watching Tom Hanks attempt to outwit a band of determined Somali pirates in your Captain Phillips). While the women of this season’s Oscar-bait films will be given their kudos in good time – Meryl’s back! – the men vying for the industry’s most coveted, or at least its shiniest, prize are worthy of particular note. The five-nominee limit seems particularly restrictive this year.

Those with the largest amount of buzz surrounding their performances include Chiwetel Ejiofor for Steve McQueen’s 12 Years A Slave, Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club, Robert Redford in All is Lost, Forest Whitaker in The Butler, and the aforementioned pirate captive, Tom Hanks, in Captain Phillips. So that’s five, right? Technically speaking, yes. But with such a talented group to choose from, we wouldn’t be surprised if five or six other actors slipped into one of the coveted nominee slots.

Take Bruce Dern in Alexander Payne’s (Sideways) latest film, Nebraska. The twilight (referring to age, happily no association with the franchise) actor took home the Cannes Film Festival prize for Best Actor for his performance as a sick old man who travels with his son (Will Forte) from Montana over to the titular state in the hopes of claiming a $1,000,000 lottery prize. Word has it Nebraska was a festival crowd-pleaser, a sentimental favorite whose popularity (assuming the Cannes enthusiasm translates to a wider viewership when the film opens next month) could boost Dern’s chances.

Prisoners certainly has widespread appeal on its side, if box-office numbers are anything to go by (according to Rotten Tomatoes, the film is currently tracking at $47.5 million). And Hugh Jackman has been turning the heads of critics who’ve felt a bit lukewarm about the actor since his turn in the “mild box office hit” The Wolverine. In Prisoners, Jackman plays the father of a six-year-old girl gone missing, a man whose natural paternal anxiety evolves into something far darker when the investigation stymies and he feels compelled to take matters into his own hands. Prisoners boasts solid performances by Jake Gyllenhaal and Paul Dano as well, but the movie really is the Jackman show.

Making a strong showing of his own, Idris Elba as Nelson Mandela in the upcoming biopic Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom should also not be discounted. The Academy loves an epic, loves a romance, loves a history film, loves great actors playing giants of politics… it may very well love Elba and the vehicle behind him enough to give him a nomination.

For a few longer, though by no means faulty, shots, there’s Leo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese’s upcoming The Wolf of Wall Street, as well as Oscar Isaac in the Coen Brothers’ Inside Llewyn Davis. After five films together the pairing of DiCaprio and Scorsese could almost be called classic, and certainly one which highlights Leo to great effect. And who doesn’t love a Coen film?

Finally, my particular vote for underdog (for all the aggressive campaigning behind his film) nominee goes to Michael B. Jordan for his star turn in Fruitvale Station. Our Tomris Laffly said Jordan turned in a “remarkably mature and humanistic performance,” one which proves the former cult TV staple (he’s previously appeared on “The Wire” and “Friday Night Lights”) is an eminently watchable adult force to be reckoned with.

In alphabetical order, then, here is our list of would-be Best Actor contenders for the 2014 Academy Awards:

-Ejiofor, Chiwetel (12 Years A Slave)

-Elba, Idris (Mandela: The Long Walk to Freedom)

-Dern, Bruce (Nebraska)

-DiCaprio, Leonardo (The Wolf of Wall Street)

-Hanks, Tom (Captain Phillips)

-Isaac, Oscar (Inside Llewyn Davis)

-Jackman, Hugh (Prisoners)

-Jordan, Michael B. (Fruitvale Station)

-McConaughey, Matthew (Dallas Buyers Club)

-Redford, Robert (All is Lost)

-Whitaker, Forest (The Butler)

Check out the trailer for Cannes Grand Prix-winner 'Inside Llewyn Davis'

The trailer for the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis just released, months after the folk music drama was awarded the Grand Prix by the jury of the Cannes Film Festival this spring, so its release is by no means a first look at the '60s-set musical drama. If anything, the trailer is a bit lackluster compared to the more enthusiastic reviews that came out of the festival.

What's most striking about the trailer isn't how the Coens' lay out the struggles of the title character (Oscar Isaac), a young folkie breaking into the Greenwich Village musical scene, but the visual choices. The movie appears to have been color corrected to give it a washed-out, vintage feel, but the palette felt off to me. Normally I like movies more after the colors have been amped up beyond their natural look, but the feature also had a soft-focus look that bothered me. That said, Variety's review mentions the feature has "playful, evocatively subjective reality," which allows the filmmakers to "[avoid] the problems endemic to most period movies." Maybe that's where the soft, washed-out cinematography comes in.

The trailer gives a nod to the major actors: Carey Mulligan, almost unrecognizable, as a dark-haired woman impregnated by Davis; recurring Coen Brothers player John Goodman; and Justin Timberlake. About a minute into the trailer, Marcus Mumford (of Mumford & Sons) sings a cover version of Bob Dylan's "Fare Thee Well." The CBS Films release comes out Dec. 6, and if its Cannes reception holds, the Coen Brothers will be making another trip to the Academy Awards in early 2014.

Cannes awards top prize to a frank and intimate love story

J. Sperling Reich offers an up-close look at the Cannes jury's awarding of the Palme d'Or to a groundbreaking drama.

After 12 days that served to highlight the major aesthetic, narrative and commercial differences between modern American and European movies, Blue Is the Warmest Color, an entry from the latter, took home the top prize at this year's Cannes Film Festival.

Rather than awarding the Palme d'Or solely to the movie's French-Tunisian filmmaker, Abdellatif Kechiche, the festival jury headed by Steven Spielberg took the unusual, and possibly unprecedented, step of including the film's two lead actresses, Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux, when handing out the trophy. To anyone who has seen Blue Is the Warmest Color, such a move will make perfect sense.



Based on Julie Maroh's graphic novel of the same name, the film tells the story of Adele (Exarchopoulos), who at the outset of the story is a 17-year-old high-school student struggling with her own sexuality as she enters adulthood. Adele soon meets and falls in love with Emma (Seydoux), a blue-haired art student just a few years older. Over the course of three years, their intense love affair promots a sexual awakening and understanding in Adele that ultimately leads to her own self-awareness and heartbreak.

Kechiche has the audience spend nearly three hours with his characters, often framing Exarchopoulos and Seydoux in tight shots where all of the emotion in a scene must be captured through facial expressions. Based on the extended and graphic sex scenes, which in no way could have been simulated, there was no room or escape for either of the actresses, who had to fully commit to their roles. One journalist I spoke with from Lille, France, where the film was shot, said that she witnessed Seydoux mentally deteriorate during the course of production as she tried to please the demanding and obstreperous Kechiche.

The performances are so powerful, Exarchopoulos and Seydoux seemed a lock to share the Best Actress award at the festival. That's why when Bérénice Bejo (best known for her Academy Award-nominated turn in The Artist) was announced as the winner for her role in Asghar Farhadi's The Past, everyone, including the actress, seemed surprised.

The jury's decision to name Exarchopoulos and Seydoux in awarding the Palme d'Or may dampen the praise for Kechiche as the auteur behind Blue Is the Warmest Color, but, as Spielberg pointed out in Cannes after the awards ceremony, it was absolutely necessary. "It was such an obvious important inclusion because of the synergy created by the maître en scène and the characters of Adele and Emma," the jury president said. "If the casting had been three-percent wrong, it wouldn't have worked like it did for us. Had anything been just a little bit left of center, it wouldn't have had such a positive resolution. It was the perfect choice between those two actresses and this incredible, very sensitive and observant filmmaker. We really felt, all of us, that we needed to invite all three artists up on the stage at the same time."

Which is precisely what the jury did. The jury also included the likes of actress Nicole Kidman, actors Daniel Auteuil and Christoph Waltz and filmmakers Ang Lee and Cristian Mungiu. Though none would talk specifically to the decision-making behind specific awards, the selection of Blue Is the Warmest Color for the Palme d'Or and the inclusion of the actresses in the prize seemed to be unanimous.

That a film most in Cannes referred to as "the three-hour lesbian movie" should win the top prize during a year in in which gay marriage is being debated all over the world and legalized in France in the midst of the festival is merely coincidence, according to Spielberg. Rewarding Blue Is the Warmest Color with the Palme had nothing to do with what the press has dubbed a "pink revolution."

"Politics was not a companion in our decisions and in our discussions about any of the films. Politics was not in the room with us," Spielberg insisted.

Romanian filmmaker Mungiu agreed. "We were trying to give awards for cinema and the stories and not for any kind of political statements. We decided the Palme d'Or because we saw a lot of truth there [in the film]. We never talked too much about the subject, if it's important that it's a gay film or not. It's not a gay film at the end. The cinema is wonderful in the film. HIs understanding of cinema. His desire to go beyond the regular limits of cinema and to test the limits of what a filmmaker can do."

And does a film featuring extensive nudity and graphic sex have any chance of being seen in certain parts of the world, including America? Spielberg said the jury didn't even take such issues into consideration. "For me, the film is a great love story," he observed. "It's a great love story that made all of us feel like we were privileged, not embarrassed, to be flies on the wall, privileged to have been invited to see this story of deep love and deep heartbreak evolve from the beginning in a wonderful way where time stood still because the director didn't put any constraints on the narrative, on the storytelling. He let the scenes play as long as scenes play in real life. We were absolutely spellbound by the brilliance of the performances of those two amazing young actresses. We didn't think about how it was going to play. We were just really happy that somebody had the courage to tell the story the way they told it."

Spielberg and company didn't completely ignore films from the Americas and Asia when selecting award winners. The Coen Brothers' widely praised Inside Llewyn Davis, set amidst the world of the emerging New York folk-music scene in the 1960s, was honored with the Grand Prix, generally considered to be the runner-up prize in Cannes. The Prix du Jury went to the switched-at-birth drama Like Father, Like Son from Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda. Best director was given to Amat Escalante of Mexico for Heli, which was a bit of a shocker given that the film seemed mostly derided in Cannes. The ambitious A Touch of Sin by Chinese director Jia Zhangke was tapped for best screenplay.

Best Actor, which many festivalgoers had predicted would go to Michael Douglas for his portrayal of Liberace in Steven Soderbergh's Behind the Candelabra, went instead to Bruce Dern for his noteworthy performance in Alexander Payne's black-and-white drama Nebraska. The film features Dern as an aging alcoholic who winds up on a road trip through his old hometown with his grouchy son. Don't be surprised if Dern's name is mentioned more frequently as next year's Oscars roll around.

Memorable encounters with the foreign press at Cannes 2013

FJI correspondent J. Sperling Reich reports on two memorable press conferences at the 2013 Cannes Film Fest.

Over the years, the Cannes Film Festival has played host to some of the most memorable filmmaker press conferences on record. There was the time Vincent Gallo arrived to speak with the international press corps about his film Brown Bunny, to a chorus of boos and hisses. Or the controversy in 2011 when Danish filmmaker Lars von Trier, in Cannes for Melancholia, said he sympathized with Hitler and called himself a Nazi. Von Trier was made persona-non-grata at the festival and was forced to issue an apology, which he later retracted.

Not all press conference highlights are disastrous incidents, however. Some years the most lasting memories are delivered during the press conferences which are lighthearted, fun and those that illicit the most laughter or spontaneous applause. With journalists gathered from all over the world, many of whom become tongue-tied when speaking to giant movie stars and filmmakers in their non-native language, a noteworthy moment that will be recounted for years is always just around the corner.

That was precisely the case at this year's festival on a number of occasions, beginning with an exchange between a German journalist and the Coen Brothers, who were in Cannes with their latest film, Inside Llewyn Davis, a period piece set in New York's emerging folk-music scene during the early 1960s. Justin Timberlake, who plays a folk singer in the movie, and T Bone Burnett, who produced the music, were among those in attendance.



German Journalist: I have a question about the humor in the film. We Germans are not known for having a great sense of humor. (laughter)

Joel Coen: They call him Curly and yet he has no hair. (more laughter)

Journalist: Before the war there were great comedies made in Germany and very funny songs. Somehow the humor left with the war and the Holocaust and Billy Wilder went to Hollywood. Now in Germany they wonder if the humor was German or if it was Jewish and there are academic conferences about Jewish humor. What do you think? Does it exist, and if so how would you describe it?

…Cricket….Cricket.

Justin Timberlake (breaking the silence): I smell a trap! (explosive laughter)

T Bone Burnett: You don't want to run off the smart people first of all.

Coen: Yeah, there's nothing like a holocaust to put a stake in the heart of a certain kind of humor. (laughter) I really don't know how to answer that.

Burnett: I have to say that is a provocative and fascinating question and I want to investigate that. I'm very interested in that question. I'm serious.

Timberlake: Well-played. Well-played.

Spontaneous moments like that often play a part in making a Cannes press conference one that journalists covering the festival talk about for years to come. It wasn't a big surprise that the press conference for Max Rose turned into a laugh-fest, with both the legendary Jerry Lewis and actor-comic Kevin Pollak on the dais. In the film about an elderly jazz pianist, the two comedians tackle dramatic roles. Their press conference provides an example of just how quickly a boisterous Cannes session can be brought right back down to earth.

Journalist #1: It's a great honor to ask you a question about your career. Could you speak to us about the artistic and human relationship with your partner Dean Martin?

Jerry Lewis: He died, you know. (massive laughter)

Kevin Pollak: They see a lot less of each other.

Lewis: (responding to a few disapproving glances) What?! He may not know!

Pollak: It is a news conference after all. (continuous laughter)

Lewis: Because when I arrived here and he wasn't here, I knew something was wrong! (uncontrollable laughter)

Swedish Journalist: (wearing a bright red turtleneck—in balmy Cannes—the same color as Lewis' shirt and over continued laughter) I really hate to be given the mic right now, but it's very nice to be here. You talked about the fact that this script was the best one you've seen in 40 years.

Pollak: Yeah, much like that turtleneck, by the way.

Swedish Journalist: You did a film in Sweden in the early ’70s with people like Harriet Andersson and Pierre Étaix. It's called The Day the Clown Cried.

Jerry Lewis: (curtly and heavily exhaling) I remember the title.

Swedish Journalist: I've heard that you've been almost angry when people have asked you about it. I have heard that you have it locked in a vault. I've heard that we'll never see this film.

Jerry Lewis: (interrupting) That's exactly where it's going to stay.

Swedish Journalist: Can you tell us a little bit more about it. Why is it going to stay inside the vault?

Jerry Lewis: Because I thought the work was bad. (long pause to wait for laughter which never comes) Hello?! (laughter) And because I wrote and directed the film and didn't make it accessible. I didn't make it available. It didn't make anything. It was all bad. And it was bad because I lost the magic. And that's all I can tell you about it. (growing increasingly aggressive) You'll never see it. No one will ever see it because I'm embarrassed by the poor work. Every creator has the right of choice and he has the right to make final decisions that relate to the work. And I made a decision, I don't know of a lot of people that would have done it, but that's of no consequence. I did it because I believed in the work and the way it should have been and it wasn't. I don't have the ability to send out poor work and get paid for it. I can't do that. And that's the only thing I will discuss when that title comes up. Thank you.

It's hard to believe Jerry Lewis could take the laughter out of a room, especially in France, which is precisely why we'll be hearing about his appearance at this year's festival for years to come.

'Only God Forgives' and 'Nebraska' have mixed receptions at Cannes

Two movies with U.S. theatrical releases later this year are receiving mixed reviews from Cannes. At the festival, writer/director Alexander Payne's Nebraska elicited some tepid reactions. The Drive
follow-up from Ryan Gosling and director Nicolas Winding Refn, Only God Forgives, was booed by at least some members of the audience.

Paramount Vantage has given Payne's Nebraska a November 22 release date, right in the heart of awards season. Based on the screening, THR predicts the distributor "should be able to ride accolades for this very fine Cannes competition entry to respectable specialized returns in fall release." Not everyone was impressed, though. Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeff Wells called the movie a "a double. Maybe even a single" in a tweet, dubbing it a "minor Payne." "Thompson on Hollywood" also called the film "wistful but slight." But both Variety and THR gave generally positive notes. They may have been looking over each other's shoulder, because both made separate references comparing parts of the father-son road trip to The Last Picture Show and the movies of Preston Sturges. The black-and-white drama stars Bruce Dern and Will Forte as father and son, and a cast of relative unknowns reportedly fills out the supporting characters nicely.

The violence in Only God Forgives may have been the biggest turnoff to Cannes audiences. Variety's Justin Chang noted that "early rumors that Only God Forgives had been slotted in competition at the producers’ insistence" seemed confirmed by the movie's poor showing, while also conjecturing that "it would no doubt have been greeted with less hostility" in the "Midnight Screenings or the Directors’ Fortnight sidebar." New York's "Vulture" blog observed that most of the negative reactions had to do with the "ultra-violence," while joining a chorus of other critics hailing Kristin Scott Thomas' performance as Gosling's character's mother. Only God Forgives comes out July 19th through Radius/Weinstein Co, which should cover both Winding Refn cinephiles and violence-hungry VOD audiences. THR, for one, predicts the feature "will not disappoint devotees of the Nicolas Winding Refn church of fetishistic hyper-violence."

For more out of Cannes, check our posts by J. Sperling Reich on Screener.

 

Soderbergh's 'Behind the Candelabra' strikes a chord at Cannes

Why is Steven Soderbergh's latest bypassing North American theatres? J. Sperling Reich reports from Cannes.

Though the Sundance Film Festival has made a habit of programming movies, especially documentaries, produced by premium cable networks, for a television movie to make it into competition at the Cannes Film Festival is nearly unheard of. Sacrilegious, even.

Not so this year, as Steven Soderbergh's biopic of pianist and entertainer Liberace, Behind the Candelabra appears in the official selection despite having been produced by HBO. Maybe the movie's inclusion is due to the fact that it will open theatrically outside of North America. Maybe it's the festival's admiration for Soderbergh's work. No explanation was given, and after the film screened for critics early Tuesday morning, it became apparent none was needed.



Behind the Candelabra depicts the last decade of Liberace's life and his romantic relationship with a young man 40 years his junior, Scott Thorson. The film features Michael Douglas playing Liberace in one of the best performances of his career, alongside Matt Damon as Thorson. At the conclusion of the initial screening in Cannes' Grand Théâtre Lumière, if audience members weren't talking about what a shame it is neither actor will be Oscar-eligible for their work in Behind the Candelabra, they were certainly thinking it.

Not that Soderbergh and producer Jerry Weintraub hadn't tried to get the film made at a studio, it's just that none would green light it. "I think the feeling just was when we were going around with it four or five years ago…they weren't convinced that there's an audience for this film except for people who are gay," Soderbergh explained. "When they sort of looked at the economics, when you’re going to spend $25 million to release a movie, which means you have to make $50 million to get your 25 back, I think there was a sense that it was a very risky proposition."

Speaking at a press conference for the film in Cannes, Douglas took this theory one step further. "I don't think the problem with Behind the Candelabra was because of the gay issue, it's just that studios don't like to be bothered with smaller pictures," said the actor. "They don't seem to like to have to worry about smaller pictures and smaller budgets, and therefore cable television in the States has become an access point."

Soderbergh pointed out that, more and more, some of the best storytelling and filmmaking can be found on television. Over the last ten years, this has caused a migration of not only audiences to outlets such as HBO and other cable networks, but also some of the most talented actors, writers and directors. "Certainly there is a lot of great TV being made in the States right now and I feel like in terms of cultural real estate, TV is really taking control of a conversation that used to be sort of the exclusive domain of movies," Soderbergh observed. "I don't view this as good or bad, it just is what it is. It's an interesting new model if you're someone who likes your stories to go narrow and deep. It's a novel on screen. I think it's exciting."

So does Richard LaGravenese, Behind the Candelabra's screenwriter. "You can have ambiguity in television that you're not allowed in film," he explained. "Television is expanding and films seems to be constricting. At least Hollywood studio films. TV is where a writer can write his novel. You can have episodes that are purely character-driven without plot that are just about nuance and shades of the human condition that you can't do in film anymore."

When it came to actually making Behind the Candelabra, Soderbergh said he never gave a second thought to whether it was being produced for television or theatrical release. He simply set out to make the film he had always envisioned. He didn't even change the already modest budget, once HBO came on board to finance the project. "Fortunately when we were making the film, we had already set in motion the ability to release the film theatrically outside the U.S." he noted. "There was never any discussion about trying to do any sort of maneuvering to get a theatrical release in the U.S. Our attitude at the end of the day is that more people are going to see it. That was really all we were concerned about."

And winning the top prize in Cannes, the Palme d'Or, would only increase the film's audience appeal. With the jury handing out awards comprised of filmmaker Ang Lee, actress Nicole Kidman and headed by director Steven Spielberg, it isn't outside of the realm of possibility. It would certainly be ironic, since Behind the Candelabra could conceivably win the Palme d'Or this Saturday evening, a mere 24 hours before it premieres on HBO on Sunday evening, May 26.

Cannes showcases two eye-opening Chinese films

FJI correspondent J. Sperling Reich continues his reports from Cannes with a look at two provocative films from China.

Lately, it has been nearly impossible to avoid any news publication, industry-focused or even general-interest, that isn't writing about the rise of the Chinese motion picture industry and prognosticating on when it will overtake North America as the box-office champion. This is hardly the reason three films from China appear in the official selection at this year's Cannes Film Festival. In fact, at least two Chinese filmmakers have brought movies to Cannes that paint very bleak portraits of modern-day China. Rather than a country ascending economically and politically, Jia Zhang-Ke's A Touch of Sin and Flora Lau's Bends depict a fractured society in which a lopsided division of wealth has created a population of ever more desperate and repressed citizens.

Many festival-goers have expressed surprise a Chinese filmmaker could produce a film that is in any way critical of the country, which A Touch of Sin most certainly is. Jia has chosen an omnibus format to tell four separate, though loosely linked, stories whose underlying themes revolve around the corruption and violence brought about by the emergence of capitalism and money. According to the director's statement in the press notes, each of the stories is based on an incident "well-known to people throughout China.”

The first story is that of a minor who decides to seek his own deadly justice against village officials who are not sharing in profits from the sale of a state-owned coal mine. This is followed by a segment about a migrant worker's realization that wielding a gun provides a certain amount of power. The third story centers around a woman working as a receptionist at a spa who goes on a murderous rampage after an important client tries to sexually assault her. The final tale is that of a young man trying find his place in the world through a series of jobs, ultimately leading to his own suicide.

This fourth story is drawn from reports that have made their way outside of China about numerous suicides taking place at Foxconn, manufacturer of Apple's iPhone. The portion detailing the receptionist is drawn from an infamous 2009 account of a nail salon worker named Deng Yujiao who stabbed and killed a local government leader after he propositioned her and treated her like a prostitute.

Bends, on the other hand, is a more cerebral film raising the question of identity within Chinese society. It interweaves two connected stories: those of a rich Hong Kong socialite named Anna and her chauffeur, Fai. The movie is set on the Hong Kong-Shenzhen border and shows signs of the tensions between Mainland China and Hong Kong. As Anna tries to conceal her family's financial demise, Fai becomes consumed with finding some way to get his pregnant wife into Hong Kong so she can give birth to their second child outside of Mainland China. As the story progresses, an unlikely and unspoken bond forms between the two characters.

It's hard to believe the Chinese government would want these kinds of stories to be detailed in a film shown domestically, let alone one screened at one of the largest and most prestigious film festivals in the world. Yet Chinese journalists assured the rest of the international press corps here in Cannes that the films would indeed be released theatrically in China. Some suggested the only censorship that might take place would be the removal of a few hyper-violent shots in A Touch of Sin.

That would be ironic given Jia’s explanation of why his movie contains so much violent imagery and narrative. "China is still changing rapidly, in a way that makes the country look more prosperous than before," wrote Jia in his director's statement. "But many people face personal crisis because of the uneven spread of wealth across the country and the vast disparities between the rich and the poor. Individual people can be stripped of their dignity at any time. Violence is increasing. It's clear that resorting to violence is the quickest and most direct way that the weak can try to restore their lost dignity."

Both A Touch of Sin and Bends were positively received when they screened early in the festival, which might not mean very much back in China. After all, upon discovering his luggage had been stolen out of his hotel room, China Film Group vice president Zhang Qiang tweeted, "This film festival is not worth mentioning!"

Cannes reception bodes well for June release 'Bling Ring'

The Cannes crowd reportedly gave a chilly reception to The Great Gatsby, but early reviews for Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring have been more positive. It's worth noting that these reactions come from the very same crowd that booed her 2004 effort, Marie Antoinette. The A24 Films release comes out in the U.S. on June 14, and I think it could do big business, drawing in young crowds who think they're getting another Mean Girls along with cinephiles interested in Coppola's latest.

Variety and THR came in with opposite reactions, though both had positive things to say. THR called the work "beautifully shot but light on social commentary," while Variety opined that "when future generations want to understand how we lived at the dawn of the plugged-in, privacy-free, Paris Hilton-ized 21st century, there will likely be few films more instructive than The Bling Ring." THR appears to be in the minority with this view, but it's interesting that one critic argues there is no larger statement, while the other thinks the work is emblematic of a generation.

Coppola based her screenplay on an article in Vanity Fair about the real-life Bling Ring, a group of kids who decided to rob celebrities of their clothes and Birkin bags. They hit Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Orlando Bloom, and Megan Fox before they were finally caught on surveillance cameras and stood trial. Emma Watson leads a cast of unknowns who play the rest of the five-fingered discount crew, and Leslie Mann plays the goofy, hippie mom who homeschools Watson and her best friend and adopted sister (Taissa Farmiga, who is the younger sister, by 21 years, of actress Vera Farmiga). Coppola has always been fascinated by celebrity, but she usually focuses on the ennui of the already famous. This time, she focuses on the wannabes. Growing up just outside the world of the rich and famous, they have a sense of entitlement about their actions. Coppola wisely doesn't mock them within the film, leading to a "intriguingly intuitive and atmospheric movie," according to the Guardian.

A24 is the same distributor that released Spring Breakers, and their trio of releases so far have focused on youth, transgression, and celebrity, to varying degrees. In an roundup, The New York Times' A.O. Scott grouped together Spring Breakers, The Great Gatsby, and The Bling Ring, calling them "fables of acquisition" that speak to the current articulation of the American Dream. If Bling Ring indeed hits a cultural sweet spot, it's possible the movie could catch on beyond the "target hipster demo" predicted by Variety.

Oscar rivals Steven Spielberg and Ang Lee share the love at Cannes

Correspondent J. Sperling Reich reports on the mutual admiration society of two recent Oscar rivals on the Cannes 2013 jury.

One could easily mistake directors Ang Lee and Steven Spielberg as competitors rather than colleagues. After all, just a few short months ago Lee and Spielberg were both vying for one of the most coveted awards a filmmaker can receive: an Academy Award for Best Director. Though many Oscar prognosticators had picked Spielberg to win the award for his film Lincoln, it was Lee who walked off with the trophy for Life of Pi. For the next two weeks, however, the two auteurs will be collaborating with seven other noteworthy members of the movie industry as judges at the 66th annual Cannes Film Festival.

Spielberg is no stranger to Cannes. His first feature film, The Sugarland Express, appeared in competition at the festival and won him the award for best screenplay. He returned in 1982 with E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, in 1986 with The Color Purple, and again in 2008 with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, all of which appeared out of competition. Now Spielberg has been charged with presiding over the Cannes jury as president, an honor he has not been able to accept previously because, as he explained to members of the press, he is usually busy shooting a film each May.

Lee is no Cannes slouch either. His 1994 film Eat Drink Man Woman appeared at the festival, as did The Ice Storm three years later. In 2000, Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was the talk of the festival. His last film to appear in competition was Taking Woodstock in 2009.

The announcement that Lee would be joining Spielberg on this year's Cannes jury raised a few eyebrows. Can two big-league filmmakers such as Spielberg and Lee work on the same jury with opinionated filmmakers such as Romania's Cristian Mungiu as well as Oscar winners Nicole Kidman and Christoph Waltz? On the first day of the festival, Spielberg assured the public the idea of any rivalry between Lee and himself was completely false.

"Ang and I have known each other for a long time and we have never been competitors, we have always been colleagues," Spielberg declared. "That will just continue. I worship Life of Pi, therefore I worship Ang Lee as well. I admire all of Ang's movies."

Sitting quietly a few feet away, Lee confirmed, "Steven and I, we're good friends. I worship him. I don't think any result will change how I feel about him."

Both filmmakers seemed to want to put the recent Academy Awards issue behind them and get on with the business at hand in Cannes. "Cannes is a prestigious film festival. It's full of opinions. It's artistically driven. More highbrow," Lee explained. "Oscar is kind of a competition of a particular group of 6,000 Academy members. It has the element of popularity. It's sort of work and business and popularity and societal. You don't know how the wind blows that year politically."

Spielberg picked up on Lee's reference to politics in discussing the difference between the Oscars and the awards presented at the end of each Cannes Film Festival. "The nice thing about this is there is no campaigning," said Spielberg. "It's such a relief that we're going to be seeing movies and we're going to be caucusing and we're going to be deliberating final results and we don't have to go through the campaigning, which as you know follows awards season in America like a political cycle. We had campaigning for the 2012 election and there's always campaigning for the Oscar election and there' no campaigning here and that is a breath of fresh air for me."

Spielberg was well-prepared to answer questions about whether he could get the eight other jurors to come to agreement when deciding which of this year's films should receive the festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or. "I'm going to have to look at the Sidney Lumet film 12 Angry Men again as a tutorial for the final day of deliberation," he said jokingly.

Besides those already mentioned, rounding out this year's Cannes Film Festival jury are director Lynne Ramsay, writer Naomi Kawase, and actors Daniel Auteuil and Vidya Balan.

Please also check out FJI correspondent Jon Frosch's reports from Cannes by visiting his blog.

Follow the Cannes Film Festival with Jon Frosch

"Away from the sun-baked Mediterranean beaches, the ultra-exclusive soirées, the red carpet and the gaggles of exuberant stargazers and dogged paparazzi that line it, Cannes is an experience lived out in the dark; the bottom line is the big, beautiful movie screen and the obsessive film lovers gazing up at it."

FJI contributor Jon Frosch will be blogging the Cannes Film Festival for France24.com. Check out the rest of his first, pre-festival post here.

For more posts, check back at The Cannes Report.

A new kind of getaway scene: 'Drive'

By Sarah Sluis

I'm not really into car chases. They require a suspension of disbelief that bores me and makes me tune out. Car chase sequences that really broke ground, like the one in 1968's Bullitt, have been so copied that watching the original feels like "same old." The only car sequence that truly freaked me out in the past decade or so wasn't even a car chase, but that out-of-the-blue car crash in Adaptation. That felt incredibly real and scary.

For this reason, I wasn't that excited about the indie movie Drive. Ryan Gosling plays a professional driver who moonlights as a getaway car driver. After a job goes wrong, a contract goes out for his death. He runs away with the girlfriend of one of his crime associates (Carey Mulligan), and presumably there's some smooching involved.

The FilmDistrict film is a selection at the Cannes Film Festival, and the festival website just posted a clip of Drive that's truly stunning. It's chock-full of suspense without going over 40mph. Car chases generally involve lots of crashing through intersections, high speeds, and improbable moves like going off a ramp on a pier and landing on a barge in a river (just riffing here). Drive takes the rare step of doing something simple and realistic like pulling over to evade the cops. I almost fainted from excitement.

I don't know if the rest of the movie will be able to pull of that level of suspense, but I also like that the first look of the movie wasn't a trailer, but a brief clip The director, Nicolas Winding Refn, has written and directed seven low-budget action/thrillers that get distributed by the likes of IFC, First Run, and Magnolia. He hasn't ever had the chance to prove himself with a larger budget or well-known stars. But within the low-budget realm, he created Pusher, so successful it was turned into a trilogy and inspired a remake. This man must be doing extremely well in the rental/DVD arena.

Drive will benefit from the support of newbie distributor FilmDistrict, which has been performing strongly. One of its first releases, the horror movie Insidious, has earned $50 million in the U.S. alone off a reported $1.5 million production budget, making it the most profitable movie of 2011. A while back, Drive was given a release date in the fall, where it can take advantage of the post-summer slump.

For a closer look at the Cannes Film Festival, check out Film Journal contributor Jon Frosch's Cannes blog.