Belgian filmmaker Jean-Pierre Dardenne (The Kid with the Bike) and […]

American cinema has always been prominent in the Cannes Festival’s programming, thanks to Gilles Jacob and Thierry Frémaux, president and programming director respectively, both of whom give our cinema ample screen time (the festival will take place May 11-May 22. Italy’s Nanni Moretti will be president of the jury). Last year, Cannes was the launchpad for two American productions, The Artist, which went on to win the Oscar, and Tree

The genial movie-lover from Rome is a multitasking kind of individual. He’s directed (The Caiman), worked as screenwriter (Habemus Papam) and produced extensively—read some early interviews of him and you’ll find out that he’s hedged his bets this way from the beginning of his career in cinema. And last night, Moretti landed the best job of all. But how will he make use of it? According to a journalist friend based in Rome, Moretti

Thierry Frémeaux (pictured) and Gilles Jacob, artistic director and festival […]

I was looking for some music on iTunes when, by some coincidence, I ran into the “Carnival of the Animals” suite by French romantic composer Camille de Saint Saëns. In fact, I was looking for some house music for my morning jog at the gymn.

The arrangement I found was by Barry Wordsworth and the London Symphonic Orchestra. The melodies had a pleasant, cinematic quality to them. The titles--“Kangaroos,” “People with long ears”—sounded as if they’d been lifted from Michel Gondry’s scrap book.

And then, the unpredictable occurred: “Aquarium,” the better-known piece from "Carnival of the Animals" came on the loudspeakers. I couldn’t believe it; this was the same music that’s been used by the Cannes Film Festival for the opening title sequence which plays before every screening (see video player below).

The same fairytale-like splendor, the whirlwind-like glissandos, it was all there—I was spellbound by it. Here I was, right back in my seat at the Lumière Theatre, waiting for the first screening to start.

The same day I contacted Gilles Jacob to ask him about this all came to be.

The much-awaited biopic on French President Sarkozy, “La Conquête” or “the Conquest,” presented outside the competition, fizzled out on Wednesday. The audience expected an intelligent story with revelations and analysis of the French political class. What it got instead it was a made-for-TV wooden narrative with nothing new or original and actors who are exact copies of the actual people they represent. The story is that of Nicolas Sarkozy’s rise to power from 2002 when he becomes Interior Minister under Jacques Chirac to 2007 when he wins the presidential elections. The two threads followed are one, the fierce in-fighting with another member of government who absolutely hates his guts, Dominique de Villepin, and two, the breaking apart of his marriage to Cecilia Sarkozy, uninterested in the trappings of power and in love with another man whom she will go away with just as Sarkozy wins the elections. We cannot be remotely interested in these people as there is no larger perspective, no analysis of politics or of the strange motivations of the men and women who pursue success in the fraught and ultimately unrewarding corridors of power. No Nanni Moretti’s “Il Caimano” (about Berlusconi) here, nor “W,” Oliver Stone’s study of Bush.

"The Conquest" generally fails except in illustrating what is well known: the tight ranks of the “legitimate” political class in France, tall graduates of the famous ENA school, well-bred and moneyed, for whom a short, ordinary man born to a Hungarian Jewish family, even when elected president, will always remain a figure of ridicule, certainly unfit to lead the French Republic.

Spotlight on this year's Cannes Selection and who the Palme winner will be. What's playing out in the jurors' hotel suite as I type these words is anyone's guess. How Robert De Niro will steer his jury is hard to tell. When Tim Burton was at the helm last year, people guessing "Uncle Boonmee" by Apichatpong Weerasethakul wouldn't have been too far off. Burton responds to dream-like, fantasy-related content, and the bewitching but slow movie by the Thai filmmaker was right up his alley. And "Boonmee" did win in the end. But De Niro? "Taxi driver," along with "Easy Rider," was one of the best-known movies out of the first independent cinema surge. Since then the "Meet the Parents" actor has usually worked with large, well-heeled movie productions. At the same time, he and Jane Rosenthal started Tribeca Film Festival which tends to showcase little-known filmmakers.

The buzz on the street has Lars Von Trier winning for "Melancholia." That's unlikely, considering what took place earlier this week (see our News article). I don't think De Niro would hand him the Palme given the Danish director's outrageous comments during the film's press conference.

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