49th Quinzaine des Réalisateurs Award Winners

Winners were announced a few minutes ago but seems official press release was sent to media earlier, as all had articles with winners before the actual "live" ceremony via facebook video.

Anyway winners are not available yet at official site and perhaps when they post, we will find the Special Mentions (if there are any) as event in section official twitter there are no mentions to special mentios (lol).

According to some cinema pundits, section top award is the one given by CICAE and this year went to an American film that quite a few film critics praised, The Rider by Chloe Zhao; then among only European films, Jonas Carpignano's A Ciambra gets the Label Europa Cinemas Award and ONLY among French films the most pleasant surprise as there is a tie between the films by Claire Denis, Let The Sunshine In, and Cannes regular Philippe Garrel's Lover for a Day.

Undoubtedly Claire Denis win is the reason why Juliette Binoche stayed for so long in Cannes as usually most top-actors come and go very fast.  Nevertheless, I'm quite pleased to see Binoche all over Cannes events and premieres.

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70th Festival de Cannes Award Winners - In Progress

Post will be in progress until after the Official Awards Ceremony next Sunday.

Awards started to be announced today and will update post as soon as awards are announced.

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56th Semaine de la Critique Selection Award Winners

As happened last year for the first time, the Critics' Week is the first parallel section that has their award ceremony and seems trend will stay for the future.

If stays, then will be the shorter major collateral event of the festival.

Most interesting is Charles Tesson, Semaine director, had the most visibility ever and not only was present in many activities -as always- but also presented film and allowed photographs. No doubt his visibility went up a few notches.

I'm always cautious with films in this section but definitively the one that called my attention the most is Los Perros; still know that probably will watch Ava that won an award tonight.

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Day 5 at #Cannes2017

Day five marks the beginning of Nicole Kidman in Cannes as the first of the four films is screened today and not less-relevant, today is the first film (out of two) with Isabelle Huppert in the lead.  But day will be on the soft side for me  as not really interested in much of the films screened today, with a few exceptions, of course.

Know that Happy End by Michael Haneke will screen tomorrow but press screening is today and I'm dying to find my favorite film critics reactions.  Not that will matter (lol) as will see film no matter whoever says whatever.  But as many in the world, I'm curious.

Will not publish until me learning press reactions to Haneke's film as will talk about them today to compensate for the films screened today at fest. By-the-way, imagine that not many have realized that Happy End poster is a cell phone... similar to what you see when you're about to take photo with your phone.  This is something that has been puzzling me as wish to know why there is a phone but at the same time I hate to have a movie spoiled and somehow suspect that if learn reason why will spoil something (big) in the movie.

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Day 4 at #Cannes2017

The most unusual question came up yesterday, why you don't do reviews anymore? Have no answer but to say that maybe will do it again, eventually when the "dry" spell I'm is over. No matter how dry the spell is, I love to learn about movies and there you have it, that's the reason why I like to do this day-to-day Cannes coverage where I learn about movies already know I like and more important, discover movies that I didn't have idea could like.  That's the answer to the second question, why do I do this daily Cannes coverage?  If you miss my reviews the next best thing for now is to learn which films call my attention as surely will enjoy them and perhaps you, loyal readers, too.  So, that's it. Thank you for your questions.

Today is another interesting day as there are several films that call my attention; unless I really lost my sight into the future, the Queer Palm winner will be seen today by audiences plus juries and was seen yesterday by the press with the very positive reactions. Also today a quiet American film which is kind of an oxymoron especially because has two top Hollywood stars and a Mexican film with all the right credentials including an actress from the last Almodovar film.

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Day 3 at #Cannes2017

The third day starts with yesterday's news as the most talked buzz is (again) about Netfllix as at yesterday's press screening "something" went wrong and after about 7 minutes the screen went black when film was stopped generating loud boos from critical press audience.  The incident generated lots of speculations including an "anti-Netflix conspiracy"; but incident was resolved with an apology from festival organizers that read as follows:

A technical problem disrupted the beginning of the screening of Bong Joon Ho's film, Okja, which was shown this morning at a press screening at the Lumiere Auditorium . The session was interrupted fora  few minutes but was then able to carry on as normal. This incident was entirely the responsibility of the Festival's technical service, which offers its apologies to the director, his teams, the producers and the audience at the showing.

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Day 2 at #Cannes2017

The first day of the festival is over as well as the beginning of the anniversary celebrations with the formal dinner after the opening ceremony.  By-the-way, in the era of ubiquitous cameras is not surprising to see photos of empty seats! Yes, yesterday was able to see how many rows in the Palais were empty, minutes after the festival was declared open and before the opening film began.

Gee, perhaps a good idea will be to have seat-fillers (like in the Oscars) but in this case with people that actually like the cinema and wish to watch the opening film or maybe there should be some control with the many "celebrities" that walk the red carpet for the photographers and not for the cinema event or in the extreme case, perhaps organizers should avoid hard-proof possibilities and should ban cell phones/cameras! (LOL) (I'm kidding-about cells only)

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Day 1 at #Cannes2017

Finally D day has arrived and even do there area a few hours more to the opening ceremony some activities already happened, like the opening film photocall and press conference plus critics already are venting how much they like film or don't like it all!

Opening Ceremony

Was too-short and too-much Pedro, so there was nothing else except for the main competition, not even a hello to the other juries much less movie clips for Un Certain Regard and other sections.

Truth is that film clips collages are always what attracts me and was not disappointed with the clips from the 19 films in competition nor with the Tribute to Pedro Almodovar.  Just for these two pieces will watch the ceremony again, sigh.

Will post video as soon as becomes available for those that wish to see all the colorful celebration of Pedro Almodovar filmography and music in his films.

Today is an easy day as only one film was screened but this afternoon press have seen already films that will be screened tomorrow and yes, there are tweets with their initial reactions but that will be posted tomorrow.  Let's start with the opening film.

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Live TV #Cannes2017

Today's Agenda - Wednesday May 17

06:16pm Red Carpet Opening Ceremony

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One Day to #Cannes2017

Finally one more day as tomorrow, May 17th, the festival will open with the Opening Ceremony that this year and due to all the official site changes and for the very-first-time in recent years, have the unsettling sensation that the ceremony will not be open to the world live.  Let's hope I'm wrong and if there is worldwide access will post link and/or video in this blog.

Since yesterday celebrities have been arriving to Nice airport and there are lots of nine-unfashionable photos for Marion Cotillard, Jessica Chastain, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Julianne Moore, Maren Ade, Fan Bingbing, Monica Bellucci and more.  If you wish to see some go to my pinterest site here where everyday will have new photos from photocalls, press conferences, red carpets, etc.

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Three Days to #Cannes2017

Finally today organizers released the names of the jurors in ALL juries! Will stop this post to update main Cannes post will the names. Done.  Please check the jurors as has been a long time since a jury has so many outstanding directors together (!!!) as the short films jury has. Great!

Cannes in Numbers

Even when is not at the official site, let me share some interesting figures from this edition that hope are accurate. After all consideration selected only some that probably have less chance to be wrong, sigh.

-There are 60 films from 36 countries in the Official Selection.  Films were selected from 1,930 entries which is a bit higher than the 1,869 film considered in 2016.  From this total, 19 films are in competition and 18 in the Un Certain Regard competition.

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70th Festival de Cannes Official Selection Lineup - Update 2

A few minutes ago organizers announced the jurors that will work with the already announced presidents of the four different juries that will award the official section prizes.

Un Certain Regard jury will award its prizes to the winners, chosen from its selection of 18 films, during the section Closing Ceremony on Saturday, May 27th at Debussy Theatre.  Check below to learn all jury members.

The Short Films and Cinéfondation Jury will be awarding prizes for the 16 student films shown as part of the Cinéfondation Selection; prizes will be announced on Friday, May 26th at an Awards Ceremony in the Buñuel Theatre, which will be followed by a screening of the winning films.  The Jury must also name the Short Film Palme d'Or winner from among the 9 films in Competition which will be awarded at the festival Awards Ceremony on Sunday, May 28th in the Grand Theatre Lumière.  Check below to learn all jury members.

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Four Days to #Cannes2017

Believe it or not, next week the most prestigious film festival in the world will (finally) start and yes, the biggest cinema party will start as well.  Great!!!

There have been many incidents, events and situations happening this year because of all the first-time-ever's that festival organizers decided to do this year; but, trying to be forward-positive will share what have learned about the collateral events happening in the 70th anniversary of the festival as well as some events that will generate buzz.

Cannes fait le mur 2017

Organized by the City of Cannes along with Paris Match and Nesspreso the traditional event will decorate Cannes streets with large posters of photographs from the Paris Match archives that will celebrate cinema and yes, the 70th festival anniversary.  To check the event suggest go to Paris Match site and check the slide show here as there are some samples of the photographs and posters to be use this year.

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2017 Queer Palm Selection

Has become harder to find reliable info about this edition of the Cannes LGBT award as most of the past official web sites are not working anymore and the only place to find info from official sources has become the usually dangerous "social media".

But finally today organizers via facebook and twitter accounts, announced that the selection is available this year via TÊTU, a LGBT media that according to what I read from their twitter account "c’est aussi un regard masculin différent porté sur la culture, la découverte et le bien-être" which means that gives a different masculine view about the culture, coming out and well-being. Sigh.  Seems there is no "female" point of view in this media. (!!!)

According to what is announced at TÊTU here there are seven (7) feature films and six (6) short films that were selected by organizers and according to what have been able to learn about films in ALL sections, believe there are more movies with some LGBT interest.  Imagine perhaps later organizers will figure that they should also consider them. Sigh.

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3rd L’Œil d’or Lineup

For the third consecutive year the SCAM (Société civile des auteurs multimedia) will honor documentaries with the award L’Œil d’or and this morning organizers had their press conference where they announced the members of the jury and the films that will be considered for the 2017 award.

A little background from the official site about the award for our recall benefit.  Cinema has its roots in documentary film. This unique depiction of the world is becoming increasingly popular on the big screen and among the public. It is garnering more critical recognition and becoming more visible at festivals. As such, it deserves to be acknowledged at Cannes.

The L'Œil d’Or - Documentary Award was created in 2015 by LaScam (The French civil society for multimedia authors), in collaboration with the Cannes Festival and its General Delegate Thierry Frémaux, with the support of the INA (the French national audiovisual Institute). It will be awarded to a documentary screened in one of the Cannes Festival sections: Official Selection, Un Certain Regard, Cannes Classics, Directors' Fortnight, Semaine de la Critique, Special Screenings & Out of Competition and Short & Feature-Length Films.

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