POSTCARDS FROM CANNES
May 19th - Day six.

I haven’t been to Cannes before but I had a pretty good idea of the chaotic nature of the festival. The Cannes experience is composed of the actual film festival with the competition selection and Marché du Film-film with special market screenings of films for sale which is why this festival is much more hectic than Toronto and a complete opposite to the relaxing Austin FantasticFest experience, but I just love the busyness of the Market and the buzzing main street Croisette.

It’s been rainy and grey which is just fine as I’ve been mostly spending my time in the screening rooms watching films or circling around the Marché du Film checking out all the latest products. I have sat through lots of awful films with Paul and Alan in order to find some gems, and yes there are some gems on the scene this year.

MARTYRS, the controversial nastiness which Paul already talked about, is my absolute favourite so far, but also MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN, based on Clive Barker’s story and directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, with probably the best performance from Vinnie Jones playing the bad guy whose only line is; “Welcome”. This meaty piece is a cracker. Another good one is HUSH by Mark Tonderai, about a couple trying to save a naked girl in the back of a truck who they catch a glimpse of whilst on the motorway. A film called DOROTHY MILLS by Agnès Merlet is an interesting psychological thriller set on an isolated Irish island in the old Wicker Man style involving weird children and mysterious village people. All good stuff.

I met the Finnish filmmakers of Iron Sky, an amazing looking sci-fi comedy, Sauna, horror story set in 1595, and Ever Dark, a forthcoming horror executive produced by Brian Yuzna, the guys were really eager and excited about their productions hoping to reach the hungry eye of the UK horror and sci-fi audience. I’m looking forward to seeing the end results of all these pieces.

Some of the walk-outs have been from Midnight Movie, Gates of Hell, The Coffin, Reeker 2 and Kill Theory, which wasn’t too bad but nothing original. Unfortunately there haven’t been any incredible Asian films on display this year, but we will definitely keep looking.

So, until the next time,

Johanna.

Back