Yorgos Lanthimos’s madcap follow-up to Poor Issues zips us from a mind-bending Victorian London to the current—or, at the least, a (characteristically bonkers) model of it—through which double Oscar winner Emma Stone dances with reckless abandon as vehicles are almost crashed and our bodies are dragged down hallways. A 3-part sci-fi anthology which additionally stars Hunter Schafer, Joe Alwyn, Margaret Qualley, Hong Chau, Willem Dafoe, Jesse Plemons, and Mamoudou Athie, it appears to be like set to be a surreal romp from an auteur who’s, undeniably, on the peak of his powers.
The Apprentice
Picture: Apprentice Productions Ontario Inc
After making a splash at Cannes in 2018 with the Swedish fantasy Border, after which once more in 2022 with the Persian-language thriller Holy Spider, Ali Abbasi returns to the Croisette with one thing way more standard, although no much less thrilling: an account of Donald Trump’s rise in ’70s and ’80s New York, with Pam & Tommy’s Sebastian Stan donning prosthetics and a blonde wig to play a youthful iteration of the previous president. In the meantime, a still-very-much-Kendall-Roy-adjacent Jeremy Robust takes the position of Roy Cohn, the prosecutor and fixer who acted as Trump’s mentor, whereas Borat Subsequent Moviefilm’s Maria Bakalova turns into the aspiring actual property tycoon’s first spouse, Ivana, and Martin Donovan his father, businessman Fred Trump. With the following presidential election looming and the movie’s real-life topic nonetheless neck and neck with Joe Biden within the polls, this examination of corruption and deceit couldn’t really feel extra well timed.
Megalopolis
A ardour undertaking that’s been over 20 years within the making, Francis Ford Coppola’s first big-screen launch since 2011 is well the pageant’s most-talked-about Palme d’Or contender: a debauched and decadent cautionary story about America’s future, with a star-packed solid that includes everybody from Adam Driver and Aubrey Plaza to Giancarlo Esposito, Chloe Fineman, and Nathalie Emmanuel. Early viewers’ responses have ranged from shock and bafflement to euphoria, although all agree that the 135-minute epic—which has, tellingly, nonetheless not secured a distribution deal—is an audacious piece of labor. Cannes might be essential to figuring out its destiny: there’s an opportunity it might dazzle audiences and scoop the highest prize (as one other long-gestating and as soon as seemingly cursed Coppola undertaking, Apocalypse Now, did again in 1979), or it might be a significant misfire. Both means, all the trade might be watching with bated breath.
Emilia Perez
Picture: Courtesy of Pathé Movies
