This year’s Cannes Film Festival is lacking something: star power.
Yes, Jane Fonda, Demi Moore and John Travolta are still gracing La Croisette, but the absence of major US studio premieres is noticeable.
Gone are the blockbuster debuts of yesteryear. Instead, festival director Thierry Frémaux had to make a desperate call to Universal to provide some last-minute A-list magic. That arrived in the form of a 25th anniversary screening of The Fast and the Furious.
For some, it’s a sign Cannes has lost its magic. Normally, the festival is the pinnacle of the film industry calendar – but this year it feels different.
The mood on the ground is subdued, and there’s a slower run-up to the bigger films debuting. Usually, they dominate the first week.
And yet, the same glitz and glamour still exist on this tiny patch of the French Riviera, as it has nearly every year since 1946.
Dame Joan Collins lit up the red carpet at the opening ceremony, and Scarlett Johansson and Michael Fassbender are expected to attend to support their upcoming projects.
While walking along La Croisette, I bumped into Zendaya’s stylist, Law Roach. Normally, it’s hard for him to go anywhere without being noticed, but here he has a bit more anonymity – particularly among the older crowds.
He tells me he’s winding down on an evening stroll after a busy day and preparing to host a party with Magnum.
But beyond the A-listers, there’s a nagging feeling that the atmosphere is much more muted.
One director, who didn’t want to be named, a 10-year veteran of the festival, remarked on how much quieter the streets of Cannes are. While there are still a lot of people milling around, it’s not the Oxford Circus levels that it used to be.
They also said they weren’t fans of the quality of the films in the line-up. The festival is often seen as a soft launch for awards season – last year, there were 19 Oscar nominations for films that had launched at Cannes, including Sentimental Value, The Secret Agent, and It Was Just an Accident.
‘They can be a bit s**t,’ they told me. ‘I think there’s definitely a type of film, maybe one can get a bit tired of seeing after 10 years.
‘Most of the films are not the best, but at the same time, I’ve probably seen some of my favourite films here.’
One year, they joined a random queue and ended up seeing Debra Granik’s Leave No Trace.
‘I went in with no expectations and was just blown away by something that was unbelievably powerful and moving.
‘The other thing that’s quite nice is seeing films that you’d otherwise be completely uninterested in, but in the setting of the Grand Theatre. Like, I think that year I saw Star Wars [Solo]. It’s a pretty s**t film but seeing it like that was f**king cool.’
But what has dulled the festival’s sheen?
‘As glitzy and glamorous as it is,’ the director tells me, ‘you just can’t escape the fact that it is fundamentally a marketplace and the whole thing feels unbelievably corporate at all times.
‘Even the £30 glasses of f**king rose at the Carlton just feel [like they’re] for the businessmen in suits rather than film people.’
That sentiment about two-week festival price gouging is shared by locals.
I asked an ice cream parlour worker if he enjoys this time of year. ‘Do you want the truth?’, he asked before bluntly responding: ‘No’.
Straight 8 festival organiser Alex Glynn says he’s not as worried about Hollywood’s diminished engagement but agrees that things have steadily declined.
He tells me: ‘I feel like there are a lot of screenings and events and things over the years I’ve gone to that feel like they could have more soul.’
Some in the industry point to another shift: the growing presence of influencers.
Cannes has always had a tricky job balancing the need to keep cinema at the heart of proceedings with the need for social media visibility.
The appearance of the likes of Molly-Mae Hague at previous events has frustrated cinema buffs.
Do you think Cannes has lost its magic?
-
Yes
-
No
This year, the festival has got into bed with the owner of Facebook and Instagram, bringing TikTok influencer Reece Feldman to the red carpet once again to conduct interviews on his Ray-Ban Meta glasses, alongside other content creators.
Noticeably, a beach party that is normally hard to get into had no queue and plenty of room inside. It made me wonder if there’s been more control over these invitations, more chaos behind the scenes during an uncertain year, or whether influencers were simply put off because it wasn’t as ‘showbizzy’ as usual.
Thankfully, the anti-influencer rule of ‘no red-carpet selfies’ stands firm.
There are still, of course, the die-hard Cannes fans. They lurk around the Palais des Festivals, dressed in black tie, hoping they can score a last-minute ticket for a premiere.
I spoke to a pair who had been waiting for two and a half hours. With just half an hour until opening, they haven’t given up hope.
One tells me they bagged plenty of tickets using this ‘begging on a placard’ method last year. But they had to flip a coin when only one of them managed to get a ticket the previous night.
It leaves me wondering whether Cannes can hold its place at the centre of the film world. I’m not convinced it’s over – but, as my director source put it: ‘I highly doubt it.’
Got a story?
If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@metro.co.uk, calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.