In 2008, The Class won the Palme D’or “out of nowhere” — or so it seemed, as the film hadn’t screened before a large chunk of the press had gone home. Almost as if pulling a bait and switch on journalists who stayed through the final weekend the following year in fear of missing a second Oscar-safe “surprise”, the 2009 Cannes lineup saved not the best for last, but certainly the most balls-out and commercially unviable. The two films I saw on my final day in the South of France were admirably experimental, undeniably gorgeous to look at, obstinately focused on form over narrative, so ambitious as to threaten to render that word meaningless as an adjective, and really fucking hard to watch.
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It’s Che day. Steven Soderbergh’s Guevara epic has its world premiere this evening at 6:30, and as of this 9am writing, ticket-less gawkers are already lining up outside the Palais, some with Cuban cigars, all with signs declaring their need for tickets. From a press and industry perspective, people are definitely talking about the film, but everyone seems less interested in what’s going to be on screen tonight than in how it’ll eventually be seen.
Che is screening here for the press and the public as a single, four-hour film, but it’s playing in the market for buyers as two separate pieces, The Argentine and Guerilla. This leaves open a number of possibilities: a) the film(s) could be released franchise style, ala Kill Bill; b) the two films could be picked up by different distributors (unlikely, but not impossible); and c) one half of Che could be seen theatrically whilst the other does not. Rumor has it that the second half of the story is currently in better shape than the first; it remains to be seen what would be lost if half of Che was demoted to straight-to-DVD.
And then there’s the competition. …Read more
