Cannes Do: Civilization and Its Disco Trucks

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Express' Arion Berger on the action on the screen and promotional zaniness on the street at the Cannes Film Festival.

BECAUSE OF THE SURFEIT OF CHOICE, the festivals within (and without) the festival, the publicity stunts and press conferences, the luck of the draw, the motif of the festival, every day of it, every year, is You Never Know. You never know: what you're missing, whether you'll be disappointed in what you do choose, whether you are where it's happening or if it is happening elsewhere, what exactly is happening, whether it will be worth it when you get there. Very often you never know who that sleazy-looking girl is in shorts and heels posing tartily for photographers. And what is up with the disco trucks?

That's the Croisette, pictured above, for you — a moving carnival about which no one bothers to pretend to be jaded. The foot traffic stops and gawks at the disco trucks with their cheesy fire effects and leatherclad gyrators. We spill out of a Directors' Fortnight Screening — these are not held in the Palais proper — and the foot traffic is so thick it spills a row or two of walkers into the street. Just as I think how I ought to post that information, a yellow Peugeot honks at a pedestrian in a glittery Dolce & Gabbana belt walking in the center of the lane. The man doesn't move aside and the car does not slow down. When he's hit, cars and people come to a halt and gather round, multilingually aghast and helpful, with cries of "Ambulance!"

I wonder if anyone was so sanguine the night before, when Jerry Seinfeld slipped off his ropes during a publicity stunt for his animated comedy "Bee Season"? (Wearing a bee suit, he slid down a rope from the top of a hotel to the end of a pier. Twice.)

Anyway, the stars aligned and You Never Know tipped in my favor on Thursday, as the early-morning screening sounded like a bore and I had a leisurely morning in which to stand in line for "Triangle," a film by three Hong Kong powerhouses: Johnnie To, Tsui Hark and Ringo Lam.

It isn't a trilogy but one film made by three people, and it would have been a complicated enough beastie with only one pair of hands in the mix. It's a taut, funny, offhandedly ultramodern thriller about three drinking buddies all peering down the business end of a janked economy, who agree with varying degrees of enthusiasm and trustworthiness to steal a priceless relic. But there are gangsters involved, and cheating, possibly crazy women, and modern male despair and scarecrows, and an appalling hit-and-run played for laughs and an innocent bicycle cop, and we can only watch with awe as these masters manipulate this viper's nest to their own ends. It suffers only from some slippages in tone, which is to be expected, as the press notes claim the directors worked separately. "Triangle" is most notable for putting technology to use as an extension of personality, emotion and drama — light years ahead of American films' "stressful typing" sequences in which everything hinges on someone's password. The password is Hong Kong.

The second film of the day is described to me as a touching coming-of-age drama, so of course I am not optimistic. But I'm in luck: At least "Water Lilies" is a girl coming-of-age drama, which may be less cliched than the male version. (Or versions. The plot goes "I thought about boobies all the time until I touched one." It either ends there or goes on with "That's when I knew I was gay, so I became friend with the fat Goth chick." There! You never have to see a male coming-of-age drama. You're welcome.) So, 1) girls, 2) synchronized swimming girls. Just show me a spangled maillot and two inches of waterproof mascara and I am so there.
But Celine Sciamma's lovely film gives the middle-school-aged girls at the story's center too much dignity to smirk at the kitsch factor of their sport, or their erratic, fervent, confused explorations. It's sweet but not drippy, sexy but not exploitative, and uses the peripheral but taunting presence of young men just as well as the brilliantly cast young women who are the film's heart. The director cast herself in a tiny role as a fast-food employee, and you take one look at her and think, "Huh, that's a woman destined to make a smart, funny lesbian-coming-of-age movie if I ever saw one." (Sciamma is pictured here with the film's cast, second from right.)

Thursday night is the opening night of the Quinzaine des Realisateurs, the director's showcase which debuted Bong Joon-Ho's "The Host" last year. This year kicks off with a screening of "Control," the feature debut by noted
rock photographer Anton Corbijn, pictured at right, about the British band Joy Division and the short, unhappy life of its lead singer, Ian Curtis.

Before the screening, Corbijn and a bunch of very young-looking guys and some woman stood onstage to introduce the film. Afterward, breathless and stunned, the audience erupted into thunderous applause as spotlights caught Corbijn and that astonishing cast sitting in their seats like normal people. It was the definition of the triumphant debut; you felt your head had been turned around 360 degrees — everything was normal again, but things that had gone on during the journey!

Shot in the kind of sumptuous black and white it's hard to find anymore, "Control" stars unknown Sam Riley as the moody, chain-smoking, prickly Curtis, bored in Manchester and looking for kicks via stolen medication and David Bowie records. The film carries him through the formation of the band, its ascent, his shockingly young marriage to a decent local girl (Samantha Morton, who looks a little old and far too famous for this otherwise utterly convincing package), the onset of his debilitating epilepsy and his ferocious mental struggle, which is raw and vivid but not spelled out in, like, tedious voice-over or anything.

The band is brilliantly cast, and there are lots of funny moments involving the bandmates's roughhousing camaraderie and their shabby-fierce manager, Rob Gretton (Toby Kebbel). But it's the trickiest parts — the reconstructed performances — Corbijn and his cast negotiate with equal shares aplomb and abandon. Riley is simply jaw-dropping as Curtis singing, at his most naked and needy, channeling the craving for attention, the fear of exposure, spewing an uncontainable volcano of pain, spazz dancing, eye rolling and all — you're embarrassed for him, shocked by him, and can't look away. One big baby in my row even burst into tears during the first performance. But that could have been me.

So, a good day. You Never Know. Oh, and the disco trucks? They're
advertising some energy drink called Burn. So now I do really know. Good night.

Friday: The Coen Brothers shoot to thrill, Juliette Moore plays a tormented
'50s housewife, Arion walks out on Asia Argento.

Photos by Arion Berger/Express, Peter Kramer/Getty Images, Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP/Getty Images and Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images