Critics' survey: Fest feeling a bit green


By Kirk Honeycutt and Ray Bennett
CANNES -- Can a green ogre make off with the Palme d'Or? At the midway mark at the Festival de Cannes, jurors might be reconsidering "Shrek 2," the computer-animated cartoon from DreamWorks, mostly discounted going into the festival. With an In Competition lineup marked by solid though seldom exceptional work, perhaps "Shrek 2" stands a chance after all of becoming the festival's first-ever animated grand-prize winner.

The 2004 In Competition entries certainly have played better than last year's much-criticized slate. But the films fall far short of the glorious Cannes of two years ago, which saw a host of artistic achievements unspool, with "The Pianist" proving the eventual winner. At this point in the festival, films screened so far are more admired than loved.

The ultraviolent "Old Boy," by South Korea's Park Chan-wook, contains graphic brutality and features guys in dark glasses and funny haircuts, which should be right up the alley of jury president Quentin Tarantino and, for that matter, jury member Tsui Hark.

The Japanese entry "Nobody Knows" is a funny but heartbreaking story about four children left alone by their mother. Directed by Kore-eda Hirokazu, it is a richly nuanced evocation of loss and fortitude as the four youngsters get by thanks to the discipline and resourcefulness of the eldest, Akira, captivatingly played by Yagira Yuya. A major drawback is that the film is about 30 minutes too long.

A less classical piece of filmmaking but a breath of fresh air is "The Edukators," the first German-language entry In Competition in 11 years. Directed and co-written by Austrian Hans Weingartner, the film follows three modern youngsters trying to find a way to rebel against a society run by capitalists, many of whom were rebels themselves years ago.

Funny, suspenseful and intellectually engaging, the film features charming performances for the jury to consider by its three young leads, Daniel Bruhl ("Good bye, Lenin!"), Julia Jentsch and Stipe Erceg and also Burghart Klaubner as a businessman they kidnap almost by accident.

Walter Salles' "The Motorcycle Diaries," a Kerouac-ean-style road movie based on the diaries of Che Guevara, is a smartly scoped story of great personal growth and transformation. The trek/buddy movie features strong acting from Mexican star Gael Garcia Bernal and Rodrigo De La Serna that may be remembered when prizes are handed out Saturday night.

Most critics generally praised "Comme une image" (Look at Me), by actress-turned-director Agnes Jaoui. An adroit coming-together of sharp dialogue, superb acting (including the director's) and classical music, this intimate ensemble tale of an egomaniacal, self-absorbed author and his pudgy but not unattractive daughter who longs for his approval must rank a favorite. Certainly, the jury will have to consider the film in several categories, including script, director and actors.

The two documentaries In Competition for the first time are both problematic. The better one, Jonathan Nossiter's "Mondovino," is a thoroughly engrossing deep dive into the world of winemaking, virtually a brand-new topic for nonfiction filmmaking. Nossiter, a former Sundance winner and a sommelier -- now there's a combination -- knows his stuff and asks all the right questions of vignerons in Burgundy, Languedoc, Bordeaux, Napa and Tuscany, not to mention South America. But footage, culled from a projected 10-hour TV series, proves unwieldy. The docu gets swamped with much repetition, annoying shots of winery dogs and footage wasted on verbal flubs by the talking heads.

Michael Moore's harsh critique of the Bush administration's foreign and security policies, "Fahrenheit 9/11," is more agit-prop than documentary. Jurors may want to vote Bush out of office but are unlikely to reward a docu where nearly all of the information and footage come from other sources -- unless, of course, the jury's collective political bent proves susceptible to Moore's emotional pitch. In that case, a jury prize might be in the offing.

Emir Kusturica's serio-comic meditation on the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s, "Life Is a Miracle," is awfully chaotic, but it does seem to get better as it goes on. It certainly has the best soundtrack as Kusturica's band, the No Smoking Orchestra, plays brilliantly throughout the film.

Paolo Sorrentino's "The Consequences of Love" is a finely wrought study in mood and character. In telling about the lost life of a middle-age man on the fringes of the Mafia, the film meticulously brings us into his melancholy existence with an artful use of sound and visuals. Yet in a reverse of the Kusturica experience, this movie becomes more conventional and less interesting as it goes on.

The Coen brothers are longtime favorites on the Croisette, but "The Ladykillers," which found little boxoffice lucre back home, ranks as a long shot at best. The film never quite comes together, and Tom Hanks' strained comic performance is simply over the top.

Apichatpong Weerasethakul's "Tropical Malady," from Thailand, is art house at its artiest. Much of the film is shot at night in a jungle, making it impossible to tell what is going on.