Why So Many Cannes Auteurs Are Turning the Camera Back on Themselves
14.05.2024 - 18:03
/ variety.com
Gregg Goldstein These auteurs are ready for their close-up. When Quentin Dupieux’s comedy about an ill-fated film set, “The Second Act,” opened the Cannes Film Festival May 14, it will be just one of several movies about filmmaking and filmmakers to touch down on the Croisette. After all, directors Christophe Honoré, Paul Schrader and Josh Mond are among the other prominent filmmakers who are ready to premiere semi-autobiographical stories.
Honoré’s in-competition comedy, “Marcello Mio,” casts Chiara Mastroianni as a version of herself who — after a director compares her to her late father, Marcello Mastroianni — dresses in drag and takes on his identity. Schrader’s in-competition drama, “Oh, Canada,” focuses on a documentary filmmaker (Richard Gere) telling his life story in a doc. Mond’s drama “It Doesn’t Matter” follows two friends chronicling their lives on video.
Leos Carax’s 40-minute “C’est pas moi” is partly a self-portrait, with footage from his films and life. And Lou Ye’s Special Screenings drama, “An Unfinished Film,” examines a group of Chinese filmmakers who reunite to complete a production. While there are more movies about movies than usual, they’re following in a well-established Cannes dictum — shoot what you know.
After all, Federico Fellini’s “8 1/2,” essentially a story of a director with a serious case of writer’s block, was an official selection in 1963, François Truffaut’s “Day for Night,” an ode to a life spent on sets, opened the fest a decade later and Michel Hazanavicius’ “The Artist,” a big wet kiss to the silent film era, took Cannes by storm in 2011. But not all of these looks at the movie business led to boffo box office. For every “Sunset Boulevard” or “Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood,”
.