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Stress runs high behind the Cannes glamour
2007-05-24
It is the world's greatest film festival and everybody in movies wants to be there. But that doesn't mean they all have fun at Cannes. "I don't think it's a pleasure," said Catherine Deneuve, one of France's greatest actresses and a festival regular since the 1960s. "It's exciting, it can be very emotional for actors to come to Cannes. But it goes so fast and it's so high and then you fall down the second after because the minute your film is shown, it's finished, there's another film two hours later. "It's a little too emotional to live at that level, so I can't really say I enjoy coming to Cannes but I think it's a great opportunity for a film," she told Reuters. The magic of cinema is often hard to find in the frenetic round of press interviews, photocalls and receptions. For many participants there is little time to watch films. "Two years ago, I was in the jury and I saw three films a day and that I really enjoyed," said German-Turkish director Fatih Akin. With his widely praised film "The Edge of Heaven" ("Auf der anderen Seite") in competition this year, the stakes are higher and the experience is correspondingly more intense. "If it's like sport, then this is like the World Cup in football," he said. "When you have a film out of competition, it's like a friendly match but when you have a film in competition, then it's like playing against Brazil." For the army of journalists, cameramen, public relations people and industry executives, the pressures are different but the experience is overwhelming just the same. There is a succession of tightly choreographed events each day and mobile phones ring hot with requests to hold, delay, reschedule or cancel interviews and meetings. The Cannes legend still feeds off images from a more relaxed era when the likes of Robert Mitchum, Alain Delon or Brigitte Bardot ruled the Croisette and there was some chance of contact with the film-going public. But the festival has long since become part of the machinery that promotes major Hollywood productions and the seafront hotels are plastered with giant posters for blockbusters like "Ocean's Thirteen." Lloyd Kaufman, head of Troma Entertainment, an independent producer of low-budget horror films like "Toxic Avenger," has been promoting his films at Cannes for more than 35 years and says the festival has become steadily less carefree. "Slowly but surely Cannes has become much bigger, more corporate with many more rules. It's still the best festival in the world but it is a lot more big company-friendly," he said. "I slept on the beach when I first came here in 1971. You can't do that anymore."
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