Father Geek here with Euro-AICN CANNES report # 9, this one's got some reviews from some of the French Film Fest's best feature films... But BEWARE they're some spoilers scattered about throughout... for those of you that distain such reviews... STAY AWAY! However, if that sort of review doesn't bother you then dig right in... just don't blame us for YOUR own curiosity...

Hello... Edgard from EURO-AICN... I got these reviews this morning, so here it is, very fresh, very... new... whatever... It seems here that the new Lars Von Trier film is not as well received as I would have hoped... but again, Von Trier films are always received like that... it might be a good sign, or maybe Grozilla is so right, and that would be sad...

First here's Grozilla with reviews and news...

SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE (Be Warned... This contains some SPOILERS!!!)

I said... You may consider this review to contain SPOILERS!!!

Uh-oh, this is a strange film... 1921. F.W Murnau (John Malkovich) directs his "Nosferatu". The technical crew follows more or less confidently a director who does not give them clear information. Then comes Max Shreck (Willem Dafoe), the actor picked by Murnau to be his vampire. So well that one can wonder if he is a real blood sucker.

Original story, original treatment. After a very very long opening credit that seemed to announce a film nostalgic of the silent movies era, Elias Mehrige quickly changes side by using a semi-parody tone. Whatever the historical truth, Murnau is described as a tyrant manipulating his team according to his caprices. Fine. More curious is the entry of Max Shreck, intellectual vampire only obsessed by his thirst, but able to play cards with the crew, while eating a bat or even sometimes a technician !!

Hard to know if you must laugh or not at what could looks like a "Young Frankenstein" with a tight-lipped smile. The most confusing is the lack of stake between Murnau and Shreck : what deal exists between them? The script stays too vague about that; tackling only a little an interesting hypothesis : Murnau has promised to Shreck immortality by "fixing" him on the film. More than the eternal question of monstrosity (which is not necessary where you think), SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE talks more about imitation of life by art. An approach finally tackled in the last ten minutes when Murnau directs the sequence of Nosferatu's death. Ten minutes that turn the movie around like a pancake

(note from Edgard : it's a French expression... hope it translates well)

, ten minutes that feed the movie with a captivating subject. A disturbing epilogue that confirms the film in an in-between territory. You never know what was Mehrige's will : to demystify the cinema's world ? to make a parable about power ? If SOTV is so intriguing, it does not shine by a flat direction, taken over by the actors : Malkovich and Dafoe first. You can also wonder why it was so necessary to make up Dafoe that much, unrecognisable as Shreck. Why not have proposed that role to Udo Kier (who plays the producer) as he looks a bit alike Shreck, instead of using so much make-up ? Then you can wonder why some characters speak English with such a heavy German accent (like Dafoe). SOTV is a strange film, not unpleasant, which seems never able to choose a side. It's more likely that viewers will do the same...

DANCER IN THE DARK

The most awaited film of the festival was quickly played down.... Bjork is Selma, a Czech immigrant living in the States with her son. She's becoming progressively blind, as her son. She works in a factory to be able to afford the surgery that will give her son back his eyes. Selma is haunted by the classic American musicals from the Golden Age and is often dreaming during the day about dancing sequences in which she takes part. Only a few characters are revolving around her, like her friend (Catherine Deneuve), a man in love with her (Peter Stormare) and a couple of neighbours who own her apartment. The husband in this couple (David Morse) is a cop but got into debts to be able to keep his wife who spends too much. He profits of Selma's blindness to steal her money. She finds out and kills him by accident. She's now on the run. And here we are, at one hour and a half in a two hours twenty minutes film. Lars Von Trier has transmitted a communiqué to ask that the film's ending stay secret. So be it. This very powerful ending is anyway what saves the movie. Which started very well in fact : five minutes of music, like the chord of an orchestra, before any image is put on the screen. Five minutes in the darkness of the crowded (2500 persons I think) Salle Lumière in the Palais des festivals, it has a strong effect. As well as the video support boosted in cinemascope. But why is this long introduction so simpering, so close from the worst of télénovelas ? Selma is a nice girl, too easy-going. Like her friend, like her superior in the factory, like her son, like her neighbour (at least until he steals her money). It looks like honey in which you get glued. Other concern : these musical pieces, which take a while before happening, if Bjork is good (she's a singer after all), the other actors have difficulties to get out of the "Jacques Demy's style" (more dialogues than songs); Morse, Stormare and Deneuve announcing more than singing. Without mentioning the choreography not in phase with the music. And these sequences feel too much a process (an external sound - factory machine, train coming - gives the tone for a mechanic music not really great). Still Bjork's performance is amazing as a kind of Snow-White. During the press conference, Catherine Deneuve explained that if the shooting of the movie was so chaotic it's because Bjork does not play, she is like that. And that, for example, if Bkork was shattered by a scene, she would disappear for several days from the set. After the screening, everyone was already talking about the interpretation price. Too bad still that DANCER IN THE DARK with its Epinal image of sacrifice really irritated me before the ending makes the film take off in amazing emotional spheres. But this can not make it up for the first two hours of dullness. Lars Von Trier still was successful on the technical point of view. DITD is far behind the epidermic charges that were BREAKING THE WAVES or THE IDIOTS. The film seems to have many strong detractors but also passionate lovers. We can guess that if this film is included or not in the palmarés, animated debates will follow either way. A burning fire not worth this little Bengal light.

CECIL B. DEMENTED

John Waters is much more smarter than you could think. After the amazing PECKER, CECIL B. DEMENTED proves it again. A bunch of movie nerds kids passionate about underground cinema kidnap a studio movie star to make her the star of their film. Beyond the white trash aspect of the film, it's more the pleasure taken by Waters to give us the truths about movie buffs that makes CECIL B. DEMENTED a real treat. From the opening credits (movie theatres façades with movie titles : a multiplex showing only Star Trek and Star Wars films, "Les Visiteurs du Paradis" finally dubbed in English, "Pauly Shore a real comedy marathon",...) to the non-stopping game of name dropping, Waters says his truth to the studios. Yes, FORREST GUMP is a big turd, yes, the executives don't know shit, yes, the MPAA is not in phase anymore with the public's envy, yes, the average spectator doesn't want anymore to be taken for a stupid person with cheap scripts, yes, the financial working way of studios is outrageous... As a vengeance act, CBD is like often with Waters approximate in his casting (Stephen Dorff and Mélanie Griffith are still very good) but his directing is really scathing. The movie will certainly be rated "R" in the States, as it keeps provoking the "politically correct" (a « fuck » by minute, drugs, sexual pulses, guns,...) without being too Manichean; the "heroes" are especially dumb but how could you not be on their side when these loonies take guns and get together screaming "Let's punish the ones who make bad movies !". Fans of the excesses from Waters will not be disappointed, people puke, masturbate in movie theatres, do weird things with hamsters named "Suppo". Waters is still a subversive director, very political in its own way. It's nice to see.

I DREAMED OF AFRICA

Kim Basinger wearing only white cries for killed elephants, slaughtered by ivory dealers. Vincent Perez plays ball-trap with porcelain dishes in the plains of Kenya. Africa only exists when seen from helicopters.... IDOA is an ode to safari-photo according to vacations club... Hugh Hudson should stop making tourism and start making films instead. If he can. do it still.

News :

* Dogme goes international : after LOVERS, the quite stupid first Dogme French film, here's INTERVIEW, first Korean movie to follow the rules edited by Lars Von Trier & co. Daniel H.Byun will film the romantic meeting between a director and an actress he met during a casting. From the first details, this will be a triangle love story, a video camera becoming a more and more important character. INTERVIEW is officially Dogme 7.

* Harvey Keitel will star in SCRATCH with a.... chicken ! This film will be the animal's view on 60 characters...

* Lydia Andrei ("Victor, pendant qu'il est trop tard") will star with Gina Gershon (Showgirls), Carmen Chaplin and Anouk Aimée in BLOOMING FLOWERS, from Jonathan Zaccai, which takes place during the shooting of a film X.

:* Chiara Mastroianni should be the French girl who goes for adventures in Hollywood in PITCH, from the sharp novel on Tinseltown by Caroline Bongrand.

* Bertrand Tavernier prepares a film on French cinema production during the German occupation. The script has for main character Jean Aurenche, screenwriter who worked during this period but refused to write for the Germans. Philippe Torreton has been contacted to star.

* Emily Watson (Breaking the waves) will star in IN SEARCH OF THE ASSASSIN, which will take her in the heart of a bombing in Central America. Lee Tamahori directs.

* Amos Kollek (Fast food, fast women) joins Jos Stelling and Hal Hartley to direct EROTIC TALES which, not surprisingly, will be an anthology of nude sequences.

* Frederique Bredin is the new name rumoured to replace Gilles Jacop as the Cannes Festival general delegate. The name of Daniel Toscan du Plantier has also been advanced.

And now Champagne 2000 with an exciting review :

CROUCHING TIGGER, HIDDEN DRAGON

It is in a very crowded theatre that was presented on Monday the new film from Ang Lee. Indeed, there was a good reason to be impatient for it as it proposes us the meeting of two of the biggest stars in Asian cinema : Chow Yun Fat and Michele Yeoh, all of this with the photo director from THE BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR and the fight co-ordinator Yen Wo Ping. The film follows the martial arts legend Li Mu Bai ( Chow Yun Fat ) who decides to give his sword ("destiny") to the Emperor Tse. Yu Shu Lien (Michele Yeoh ) is in charge of this mission and things will go wrong as the sword will be stolen... The actors : Michele Yeoh gives us probably one of her greatest performances. You just have to see her with Chow Yun Fat on the screen; these two actors shine just by their presence. Also, there's Zhang Ziyi, a young actress that everyone should soon try to get. The direction : for the romanticism, you find the same Ang Lee than in SENSE & SENSIBILITY. The director alternates with a lot of ease fight sequences and romantic scenes in which he takes time to develop the psychology of the characters. Fights are new for him of course and he's very good at it by showing the technical side. Then the fights seem very fluid. Ang Lee does not hesitate to leave a 15 seconds shot on feet to show the extreme virtuosity of the fighters. In a word, this film mixes the best from martial arts films (fights in the air, on walls, in trees) and the best from romantic films (the last 15 minutes is the most beautiful since TITANIC).

Great film !!

Champagne 2000

Edgard out... Don't forget to send Euro-AICN all your Cannes Reviews and news reports ASAP.