Cannes Film Festival 2017 Talking Movies

agreement will not collapse if President Trump does as he has

threatened - and withdraws the United States.

Antonio Guterres - speaking at the G7 summit

in Italy - called on Donald Trump to stay engaged with the agreement.

Now on BBC News, it's time to look back at this year's

Cannes Film Festival in Talking Movies.

hello from the French Riviera, and welcome to this special edition of

talking movies, where we look back at some of the highlights from this

year 's Cannes Film Festival. The films that got festival-goers

talking. If I heard that a film went to Cannes, I was curious about it. A

clever satire from Sweden called The Square, and Russian relations in

Loveless. And some of the pressing issues of the day. Cinema is about

life, and right now, like us to model is. Plus the row over Netflix

showing its films at the festival. When Netflix's name appeared, there

were boos. And we look back at Cannes through the decades. All that

on this special Cannes edition of talking movies. -- Talking Movies.

It proceeded as normal this year, but there was heightened security.

The mood was subdued and a little tense after the Manchester bombing.

Festival-goers still thronged, beggars were eaten, and espresso was

down. One big difference, film wise, this year, is that no big Hollywood

studio pictures were there. But that is not to say there was no American

presidents. American indie films feature prominently in the lineup.

-- presence. One of the more eagerly awaited films was The Beguiled. The

story of a soldier during the civil war, sheltered by women at the

junior girls School. It is a reimagining of a 1971 film, starring

Clint Eastwood, that Coppola has to from a woman 's point of view. It

includes Kirsten Dunst, Nicole Kidman, and Elle Fanning. Todd

Haynes had wonderstruck in competition. It told to parallel

stories of different children from two different time periods. --

Wonderstruck. Then there was the was the well-received The Meyerowitz

Stories. Noah Baumbach's film was well received. His dialogue comes

Word for Word. These are to Montrose times, and several films at Cannes

this year dealt with political issues or pressing concerns. Whether

it be climate change, and less location, or refugees. At the

forefront of films addressing the refugee crisis was a dear old

actress Vanessa Redgrave, making her debut as a film director will stop

-- 80-year-old. The plight of the world's refugees ways heavily on

Vanessa Redgrave. To exploit the crisis, her documentary draws on a

range of media, video of her visits to a refugee camp, individual

testimonies, news footage, and a German ties to excerpt from

Shakespeare's The Tempest. For Vanessa Redgrave, long a political

activist, there were several reasons why she made a film on the refugee

crisis. It is a lifetime of events, as I see it, a whole process. But

there was a specific trigger, yes. The day that photograph was

published of the young boy lying on the pebbles of the beach. Dead. So I

thought, I need to make a film. And I put my money into that. I was in

the garden, it was a hot date. And suddenly I heard this horrendous

sound from the sky. He then she has made is thoughtful and personal. In

one section, she recalls her own World War Two excretors as a young

child, a wartime evacuee, the closer she came to being a refugee. So we

were evacuated. My brother and I, he was about one-year-old. Today, we

would be called internally displaced persons. So we were refugees, in our

own country. I was worried about having much of myself, but my

producer convinced me that telling my narrative of the Second World

War, and what happened to me, as an evacuee, along with thousands of

other children, would help people understand about refugees coming

from other countries. I thought, I must make a film, so when people

watch the film, they will feel as if they are watching relatives, not as

if they are watching some strange subhuman race. While the filmmaking

in this documentary is a little awkward at times, any shortcomings

are easily forgiven by audiences, because the subject matter is so

strong, as is Vanessa Redgrave's commitment to it. The theme of the

migrant was evident in other films at Chris Reid, such as in the

background of Happy End, and the refugee also featured fantastically

in Jupiter's Moon from a Hungarian film maker. It was the story of a

refugee travelling into hungry, and after being shot, finds he has a

superpower. He can levitate, or fly. One of the most earthbound films to

be shown was an inconveniency will. It was Al Gore's follow-up to his

climate change document tree which premiered at Cannes 11 years ago.

The new film has more action than the original. It is wrong to Louis

Bisson! -- pollute this earth. They went to wear ice is melting, where

they have been destructive storms, and the summit conference, and some

hopeful solutions for the climate crisis. The Trump administration

does not appear to be that interested in climate change. Would

you like President Trump to watch a film? Yes, I would. I don't know if

he will or not. I have criticised his policies and many of his

appointment. -- his film. I have not engaged a dialogue him. And I still

have hope that he will decide to keep the US in the Paris agreement.

-- this film. We have learnt in the last several months, however, that

not one person, even the President, can stop this climate movement. The

next generation will be justified in looking back at us and asking what

we were thinking. Could knew he what the scientists were saying? Could

you hear what Mother Nature were screaming at you? This is our home.

-- was screaming. Strong storytelling came from Russia at

this year with the film Loveless, directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev. His

last film was criticised at home. But this one was well-received here

at Cannes. Loveless is the story of eight loveless marriage in its

painful terminal phase. The two protagonists live on the outskirts

of St Petersburg with their son, Alyosha. It has become an

environment of petty arguments and toxic recriminations. And, when

Alyosha goes missing after a particularly bad bust up, two days

passed before it is notice. The police they may have more importance

is to deal with and should go Ms Hill the time.

TRANSLATION: The police reflect the interests of the government, the

people of power. When there is a tragic situation, people had to

organise themselves, and deal with it. -- and children go missing all

the time. It is a downbeat portrayal of Russian life.

TRANSLATION: So it is a true group of volunteers, which operates in big

cities in Russia. It is a matter of principle for them that they don't

take money and they are not a government enterprise. Andrey

Zvyagintsev has been criticised in the past for casting Russia in a

negative light of the world stage. Many felt his previous film,

Leviathan, a man at the mercy of violent official's story, was

condemned by Russian officials at, the Orthodox Church, and

conservative groups. This time, Andrey Zvyagintsev is keen to

soft-pedal the political aspect of his new film.

TRANSLATION: Is not a political thing, because it is more about the

inner world of a person, and the relation of their family and the

people they love. It is not a portrait of Russia. This will

perhaps give the film an easier ride with Russian from critics. To me, it

is a superior thing to Leviathan. Leviathan was too political. To my

tastes. But this one is more focused on human characters. These

characters are, however, highly unsympathetic. They are shown as

selfish, vain, and incest with material wealth, and social status.

-- obsessed. TRANSLATION: You say they are not

sympathetic. Most of the viewers will recognise themselves in these

characters. You see what is not sympathetic about these characters,

but you acknowledge that a part of you is close to them. It is a

competent a picture, a personal story, but one with political

overtones and, although the director is keen to play these down, Loveless

does reflect broken Russian institutions, and not just marriage,

but the police and the media. So will viewers aboard missed the

subtleties? They will miss a little bit. But it is not crucial. -- miss.

It is understandable work from this directive. His ability to say things

on a universal language is clear to almost everyone. There was much talk

in Cannes over the American streaming giant Netflix, which had

two films in competition. Many thought that Netflix should not be

allowed to compete at the festival unless its films will also released

some of them easily, traditionally, in cinema. The first Netflix film to

be shown at the festival was Okja, the story of a young girl struggling

to save her huge pet pig from the clutches of a huge corporation. Let

nothing come between the love of a young girl for her giant pig. Okja

is the latest movie from Bong Joon-ho. When the young girl's young

friend, a pig, is stashed away to New York to become a corporate

empire's latest product, it becomes a rescue mission. You should know

the situation is not good. Like his last film, Snow Piercer, the

director has assembled an international cast. The film got a

four-minute ovation from the press at Cannes, but was booed at the

start of the screening, when the net licks logo appeared. It led to

inaccurate reports that the film was temporarily stopped due to the press

reaction, when in fact, a technical fault was to blame. The cast were

diplomatic about the controversy. There is a revolution happen. I

figure will continue. Right now, I think it is unaware conversation is

being had. So to be a part of a conversation with a movie that

sparks further conversation, I think, is a very interesting thing,

and it is a huge honour to be included. Netflix is also funded

offbeat The Meyerowitz Stories. They are finding risky movies when

traditional studios refused to. But many critics to write their presence

here. This, Cannes' 70th birthday, is a clash between the old and the

new. The booing of companies such as Amazon on an Netflix are ways of

showing support for traditional methods of showing films, on a big

screen, and a cinema. There are fears that this could become less

frequent with the dominance of new giants. The festival has responded

to the controversy by saying that no firm can be in competition unless it

also promises a French theatrical release. The two sides of the debate

need to learn to talk the same debate. In that, they could learn a

lot from Okja. As usual, the director has made a multilingual

film, spanning different continents. Every time it is mentioned that we

will work in with different languages and there might have been

issues, I am shocked, because I did not, I have never experienced that.

It was filth like we all putting together something that is made out

of the same language. It is the pitches we are making. That is the

real land which that we are dealing in.

The potential appeal of this film to all generations should bring the

director offers from Hollywood. The outrage is only raised the profile

of the film. It is not impossible to imagine that sooner or later most

cinema fans will accept the new world order, especially if it

continues to produce such onscreen spectacles. One of the most talked

about films this year was the Square here is the filmmaker who made a

name friends or three years ago with the international arthouse hit,

force Michelle. This film is a satire centred on an art museum in

Stockholm were serious points to make. Kris Jenner is a handsome,

urbane and successful curator in a Stockholm Art Museum who is putting

on a new exhibition about trust and social responsibility. When his

phone and wallet as stolen he takes reckless vigilante action that has

devastating consequences. The film works as a razor-sharp satire of the

bush were our world, the modern media, masculinity and even Swedish

nurse. What I always do when I write scripts, I have myself as the

starting point. I think a lot about how I would react in this kind of

situation. Since I am interested in addressing the roles were trying to

play then, of course, I also want to undress Christian and when he, like,

confronts himself, down to the bone. Do you have sex with lots of other

women? And stripping him down to the bone is what the director does come

through a of increasingly bizarre situations. How often would you say

that you take women that you don't know very well and have sex with

them? He has a knack counter with a journalist. Their series of awkward

power struggles had audiences of Cannes squirming. Always? Yeah? So

what is my name? You look at a man like this and you think oh, I know

you. I know what you are up to and I know what you do. And, um, nailing

him on it a little bit and calling him out on it was quite fun. I think

we have all wanted to do that at times. I know what you are right

to... I have seen you. I see through it. The director is quickly becoming

the king of cringe with toe tellingly uncomfortable scenes frees

protagonists. Much stand-up comedy is based on awkward situations. It

creates a sort of humour that is direct and that you identify with as

an audience. Beside the direct humour, some of the most memorable

scenes in the Square expose the fine balance between our inner and outer

selves. Our social persona and our instinctive nature. During a

sumptuous gala dinner, for instance, one actor role-playing and eight

pushers and pushers at the of acceptability. In turn, reveals the

absurdity of social conventions. He is a provocative filmmaker and

revels in showing us uncomfortable sides of social behaviour and,

really, all of his films are about putting a mirror in front of the

audience making us recognise ourselves. We watch people doing

several things and think that we will never do that and then realise,

O, I would and I have. Cannes is celebrating a big birthday this

year. Its 70th anniversary. From its inception just after World War Two

it has grown to become what is generally regarded as the world's

top film Festival. We have been looking back at Cannes through the

decades. Cannes today, the mother of all film festivals. Cannes in 1946,

its first year in operation, bringing cinema of the day the

festival -goers. Cannes of the 1940s was associated with Italian

neorealism. One of the films in the first edition from 1946 was

Rossellini film. The French critics were and Susie aspect about the near

realism is. It did a big part to put neorealism on the map. And who else

would it be but Sofia Lorentz to excite the crowds? It was not only

international art cinema that defined Cannes in its formative

years. There was glitz, glamour and the media circus. Cannes was always

very good at attracting the most beautiful, talented and famous and,

certainly, if you look at some of the images from the 1950s and you

will see Robert Mitchum and Kim Novak and Ava Gardner. The glitz,

the stars on the Riviera. There really was solidified in the 1950s.

Over the years the official films slated Cannes has recognised key

films and filmmakers. Cannes is dominated as the international taste

maker for arthouse cinema. There are over 4000 film festivals the year

and many of the other full important film festivals look at what Cannes

is showing what the word star and what the word of mouth is. It

influences many other film festivals that follow. But Cannes is perhaps

not as influential as it once was in spotlight in new cinema. In the

nineteen sixties, Cannes was far more crucial is the taste maker in

the absence of other festivals, in the absence of what we now have in

terms of the Internet and social media. Everything is on the

Internet, whether it be Cannes or another festival. It is not quite

the same thing. The same thing that Cannes represented in the 1960s and

1970s. Now we get our knowledge from immediate and varied sources. Cannes

has not been without criticism. The ongoing lament is that the festival

is too much of a boys club. Gender balance is often an issue at Cannes.

There have been years where it has been an almost entirely male

competition. Slightly better this year. But even with its

imperfections, it every May, Cannes intoxicates. The striking location,

the emphasis is on fine art cinema juxtaposed with brash consumerism.

It all combines foray unique Cannes experience. That brings our special

Cannes edition of talking movies to a close. Please remember you can

always reach us [email protected] and you can find us on Facebook as well.

So from me and the rest of our production crew here on the French

Riviera, it is goodbye as we leave you with some of the sights and

sounds of the Cannes Film Festival.