This year’s Cannes Film Festival, just like every other edition of the fest, will have some attendees groaning that this or that film should have been in competition.
For example, based on my own opinion, Felipe Galvez’s “The Settlers” and Victor Erice’s “Close Your Eyes” seemed competition-worthy to me. If Fremaux wanted to have a female filmmaker then Molly Manning Walker’s “How to Have Sex” would have also done the job.
One film that was somewhat ubiquitously absent from this year’s competition was Lisandro Alonso’s “Eureka.” However, when it was finally seen, unveiled in the Cannes Premiere sidebar, critics understood why. It just wasn’t very good.
It turns out that Alonso screened the film to the Cannes selection committee at the last minute, without the finished effects, and that, after he saw it, Cannes boss Thierry Fremaux felt that it was too “intermittent” and that it could be improved.
Fremaux gave Alonso the opportunity to work on it more, without rushing it, and that maybe he could put it in next year’s competition, but not this year.
Alonso didn’t want to wait a year and wanted to just let go of the film, which he’s been working on for years now. It’s hard to believe, but he hasn’t had a film play in cannes competition before, not even for “Jauja.”