Who will win the Palme at Cannes? [2023 edition]

"6 tickets for Bros, please" pic.twitter.com/WnMXnOMYeE

— C.J. Prince (@cj_prin) May 17, 2023

When Will We Be Infamous

Kore-eda's Monster sounds like a pretty great movie overall; it is told from the points of view of a mother, a son, and a teacher. But there seems to be some dissent about it. Jessica Kiang apparently didn't like the ending and didn't think it was as 'Rashomon-like' as many reviewers suggested, and Nanako Tsukidate as far as I can tell gave it a zero on the ICS grid.

"The children appear to have a hidden capacity for spite, violence and self-harm, which creates a miasma of fear in the lives of the adults, while the schoolteachers are trying to cover up a situation that could damage their professional reputations. The parent involved is trying to do the opposite: to uncover and get at some extraordinary and scary truth."

Here we go!

What's the ranking here? Assumed it was 1-5 stars but is it 1-3?

— David (@DKeith0904) May 18, 2023

Lol, I meant this one

For the first time, Screen's famous Cannes jury grid will now be updating live - follow it here: https://t.co/mkvagnohrj pic.twitter.com/Cr8WK2fdCX

— Screen International (@Screendaily) May 18, 2023

I do remember American critics in particular deciding pretty quickly that L'Humanité was the devil

I read a critic who refused to name best actor winner Emmanuel Schotté in his write-up on the film, because his performance was not acting.

It's only day 2 and Wang Bing's Youth (Spring) easily grabs the lead - top of the leaderboard with an average of 3.5 on our 2023 Cannes Critics’ Panel. While only 8 of our 20 critics fit the 3+ hour docu in their sched, more grades will likely cement https://t.co/Z0EFrzFWYZ pic.twitter.com/z6YryiRD7e

— IONCINEMA (@ioncinema) May 19, 2023

The two best films I’ve ever seen in Cannes both star Sandra Hüller.

— David Jenkins (@daveyjenkins) May 19, 2023

Zone of Interest is getting very high praise

Zone of Interest: Jonathan Glazer’s new film is a profound and disturbing masterpiece which made me feel physically ill. @cinevue

— John Bleasdale (@drjonty) May 19, 2023

Glazer's path has been interesting af, I do wanna see this

https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/movies/the-zone-of-interest-review-jonathan-glazer-1234865296/

According to @GuyLodge's metric that if Glazer's THE ZONE OF INTEREST is good, it means this is a good Cannes, it's a very, very, very good Cannes.

Also a bone-chillingly creepy one.

— Jessica Kiang (@jessicakiang) May 19, 2023

About Dry Grasses has gotten a pretty good reaction as well

Also, the more masterpieces there are, the more likely they’re gonna give it to Ken Loach again

:) I hope not

I guess Tunisian director Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters is a work of docufiction, where actors portray real people in a historical moment. It sounds interesting

Would love to hear Thierry Fremaux’s response to this:

The only way an #autistic person can have a half decent festival experience at #CannesFilmFestival is if you’re a VIP who can afford to take taxis everywhere and stay at one of the fancy hotels by the Croisette.

The industry’s mindset will make you feel that if you’re not…

— Irene Silvera (@irene_silvera) May 20, 2023

Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon has gotten great reviews, but at 3 1/2 hours I’m wondering if it is really compelling or if it is an eat-your-vegetables kind of movie. I’m giving it the benefit of the doubt and am looking forward to it. It has Lily Gladstone

The Wang Bing Youth (Spring), which is Jeunesse on the list above, is the same length. It sounds repetitive, claustrophobic and oppressive, with occasional reprieves, but also kind of amazing

abut kids working in cramped conditions in small clothes factories in China, popping out 100-or-more baby garments per day - showing all of the sweat and toil, infighting, spats and make-ups and camaraderie in extremely dingy grungy spaces

Wait, did you watch it?

no, just listened to the Film Comment podcast that described it in detail

I skipped over their discussion of Monster. Like with Close I want to experience it for myself. (I still haven't seen Close)

in May December, “Moore co-stars as Gracie Atherton, a 60-year-old southern belle with a sun-bright smile and a brittle coating of frost. More than two decades ago she fell in love with Joe Yoo, a 13-year-old schoolboy, sparking a nationwide scandal that people remember to this day.”

That’s enough to get me interested

The Tunisian film Four Daughters sounds interesting, with the two older daughters who became radicalized by Isis played by actors (along with the mother), but with the two younger daughters played by the actual in-real-life subjects of the story

This grid appears to have all of the outliers RE: the new Glazer

Justine Triet’s ‘Anatomy Of A Fall’ joins ‘May December’ at top of Screen’s Cannes jury grid https://t.co/oSuugFKDRW pic.twitter.com/DTxLn3Wd1a

— Screen International (@Screendaily) May 22, 2023

Interesting. Here is the Intl Cinephile Society critics' grid:

Day 5 of #Cannes2023 is done. We're almost halfway folks! https://t.co/XYEFp6yt7o pic.twitter.com/765ZWXF88i

— IntlCinephileSociety (@ICSfilm) May 21, 2023

That always feels like the more reliable one tbh

In Ehrlich’s negative review of Club Zero he’s right that “no other narrative director is more skeptical of — or even hostile towards — the social institutions into which people entrust their faith”

Lourdes (2009) is about a young disabled woman with multiple sclerosis who is very skeptical about religion. She is living in a care facility and wants to go to Lourdes just for the change of scene and to be fussed over. She encounters many Catholic true believers who don’t understand her, but she in the end inexplicably is the one who is healed.

Amour Fou (2014) is an incredibly morose (but occasionally comedic) film that alternates between showing boring discussions of arcane tax law and a toxic relationship between two people obessessed with death. It is about the real life poet Heinrich Von Kleist who died by suicide after shooting his girlfriend Henriette Vogel in 1811.

Little Joe (2019), which won the Cannes best actress award for Emily Beecham, is another really memorable film, about a horticultural lab which is portrayed in a very stylized and futuristic way, where a plant is developed that releases a powerful antidepressant, with the plant eventually assuming control. Ben Wishaw also stars

Ehrlich says “It’s one thing for Hausner to question religion, which has been responsible for all manner of sins over the centuries, but antidepressants — and now educators — feel like cynical targets for a filmmaker desperate to undermine anything that might help people better prepare themselves for the difficulties of a godless world. I want to have faith that I’m misreading Hausner’s intentions, and possibly not for the first time, but I’m getting pretty exhausted by the lack of faith she seems to have in everyone else.”

I don’t think the conclusions to which the critics are reaching about her films are ones that she wants us to make. Her films are much stranger than that.

That said, this doesn’t sound like it will be winning anything

Jessica Hausner’s Club Zero lands like a little drop of poison in Cannes competition. Chill, satisfying parable of 21stC magical thinking with Mia Wasikowska perfectly cast as the tale’s fanatical pied piper. Liked this a lot #Cannes2023

— Xan Brooks (@XanBrooks) May 22, 2023

wow

I've admired every Hausner film I've seen.

‘Fallen Leaves’ snatches top spot on Screen’s #Cannes2023 jury grid; ‘Club Zero’ struggles https://t.co/S56QFy37BM pic.twitter.com/mVmbNRPoCA

— Screen International (@Screendaily) May 23, 2023

Apart from a sniffy review from Variety all the reviews for ‘Asteroid City’ I’ve seen rave about.

Neil Young’s odds keep changing. Here is his current top 10.

https://www.jigsawlounge.co.uk/film/reviews/cannes-2023/

9/2 Jonathan Glazer THE ZONE OF INTEREST (106m) Fri 19

9/2 Marco Bellocchio RAPITO aka KIDNAPPED (125m) Tue 23

7/1 Alice Rohrwacher LA CHIMERA (130m) Fri 26

8/1 Aki Kaurismäki FALLEN LEAVES (83m) Mon 22

8/1 Jessica Hausner CLUB ZERO (110m) Mon 22

8/1 Todd Haynes MAY DECEMBER (113m) Sat 20

9/1 Kaouther Ben Hania FOUR DAUGHTERS (107m) Fri 19
12/1 Trần Anh Hùng THE POT-AU-FEU (145m) Wed 24

12/1 Nuri Bilge Ceylan ABOUT DRY GRASSES (197m) Fri 19

16/1 Wang Bing YOUTH (SPRING) (212m) Thu 18

I don’t think he has registered the negative reaction to Club Zero yet, and I’m curious about his sudden elevation of the Bellocchio

broker by kore-eda was trash

No, c'mon, it wasn't trash, but it was his first meh film in years.

He has a formal command on which he can rely whereas, say, Paul Schrader, whose most recent film I like a lot, can obviously make garbage when his ear for dialogue and his wham-bam visual sense fail him.

Seems odd to not have Anatomy of a Fall at least in the top 10, much less top 3

it is now tied for number 10 on that list

"Bellocchio and the Vatican + true crime again?"

― gjoon1, Thursday, April 13, 2023

this post seems on the mark from what I've read about the film

xp IndieWire moved it to first place in its odds

https://www.indiewire.com/awards/predictions/cannes-2023-palme-dor-contenders-winners-predictions-1234864878/

Not everyone liked Asteroid City!

The new Wes Anderson is such a pain in the arse it should have been called Haemorrhoid City.

— Jonathan Romney (@JonathanRomney) May 24, 2023

The panel on the the Film Comment podcast loved Joanna Arnow's The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed (playing in Directors' Fortnight). I realise I'm not the target demographic but I've rarely been so sure that I don't want to follow a recommendation.

Enjoying following along vicariously via daily podcasts and tweets, as usual. Though the podcasts are down to Film Comment and (my favourite) The Last Thing I Saw as Little White Lies doesn't seem to really be doing it this year.

Neil Young now has Marco Bellocchio’s Kidnapped as the favorite to win the Palme d’Or, with some reshuffling of the other films, moving Anatomy of a Fall upwards

https://www.jigsawlounge.co.uk/film/reviews/cannes-2023/

7/2 Marco Bellocchio KIDNAPPED aka RAPITO (125m) Tue 23
9/2 Jonathan Glazer THE ZONE OF INTEREST (106m) Fri 19
6/1 Alice Rohrwacher LA CHIMERA (130m) Fri 26
8/1 Aki Kaurismäki FALLEN LEAVES (83m) Mon 22
9/1 Jessica Hausner CLUB ZERO (110m) Mon 22
10/1 Justine Triet ANATOMY OF A FALL (151m) Sun 21
11/1 Kaouther Ben Hania FOUR DAUGHTERS (107m) Fri 19
12/1 Todd Haynes MAY DECEMBER (113m) Sat 20
12/1 Nuri Bilge Ceylan ABOUT DRY GRASSES (197m) Fri 19
16/1 Wang Bing YOUTH (SPRING) (212m) Thu 18

film critic Donald Clarke asked him why he still had Club Zero on his list given the negative reviews and he said it was because of some inside information, that “rumours started running rife in Vienna film-circles as soon as it was announced in comp”. I'm very skeptical that that could affect the jury

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

We’re kind of overdue for an appalling d’Or anyway, no?

maybe that's right, but there's no way to know

I’m not sure what inside information this guy has, but the Palme d’Or, Grand Prix, Director, and 75th Anniversary Prize all went to films in his eventual top 5 last year

In any case I'm looking forward to watching all of the 10 films on that list, they all sound pretty great.

I've only seen a promo for La Chimera and the poster which shows the Hanged Man from the tarot. I'm pretty sure I will love it

there have been no reviews of it yet