More Cannes 2007 News

Via Monsters and Critics:

Shown at one of Cannes' special screenings, The 11th Hour "uses multiple images and interviews with the world's top environmental scientists to paint a scary yet somewhat optimistic picture for the planet." Directed by Nadia Conners and Leila Conners Petersen, the documentary "stars" Leonardo DiCaprio.

Michael Moore's Sicko via The Associated Press:

"Lost in all the publicity over Moore's trip is the reason he went to Cuba in the first place.

"He says he hadn't intended to go, but then discovered the U.S. government was boasting of the excellent medical care it provides terror suspects detained at Guantanamo. So Moore decided that the 9/11 workers and a few other patients, all of whom had serious trouble paying for care at home, should have the same chance.

"'Here the detainees were getting colonoscopies and nutrition counseling,' Moore told The Associated Press in an interview, 'and these people at home were suffering. I said, "We gotta go and see if we can get these people the same treatment the government gives al-Qaida." It seemed the only fair thing to do.'"

More on Moore's Sicko at GreenCine Daily

Via IndieWIRE:

"The form of cinema as we know it and love it, it is a thing of the past[,]" declared Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg early on during the news conference in Cannes, "it really isn't the cinema anymore." He explained that the changes in production and distribution taking place have killed cinema as it previously existed. Concluding the thought, he added, "For the young people who are developing in this current techological information environment, [it's] all still very exciting (just) as the mass cinema was for us, (but) [it's] just very different."

Via The Independent:

"Grindhouse has been one of the most thoroughly autopsied films of 2007, with pundits across the media debating why it failed. Some blamed the Easter weekend timing of the release, a slot usually reserved for family fare; others, the film's disturbing use of violence towards women which might have put off half its potential audience, (although defenders would cite that, before they get killed in Death Proof [up for a Palme d'Or], the ladies get to speak some vintage [Quentin] Tarantino dialogue). But the sheer heft of its running time has been cited as the biggest problem, a gruelling 191 minutes which simultaneously put off viewers and meant that the film could only be seen four times a day at cinemas, thus reducing box-office gross."

Via Variety:

"Julia Roberts is getting back together with Working Title Films to produce and star in a movie about the wildlife conservationist Joan Root, who was murdered in her Kenyan home earlier this year."

Via the Tribune de Genève:

"I believe this is a unique, a truly rare occasion, to have such a group of important film directors seated [together] … and to have such incredibly poor questions [from the press]! … I truly believe that it's the computer that has brought you down to this level."

That's Roman Polanski, winner of the 2002 Palme d'Or for The Pianist, at the press conference that followed a screening of the omnibus feature Chacun son cinéma / To Each His Own Cinema, which was envisioned as a celebration of the Cannes Film Festival's 60th anniversary.

After remarking on how reporters don't have to type anymore, Polanski got up and said, "Now, really, let's go eat!"

Photo: Alain Delon and Bianca di Sofia at the Chacun son cinéma screening at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès. Bianca di Sofia's dress credit: Fabrizio Capriata. Photo credit: Pascal Le Segretain