Tomorrow, Wednesday, May 13, sees the launch of the 68th edition of Cannes, the most prestigious film festival in the world – at least for fiction films. Once again, the event’s organizers, as well as those of the concurrent independently-run events, Directors’ Fortnight and International Critics’ Week, barely acknowledge that nonfiction is capable of more than just inside baseball film biographies. Out of 54 features in the Official Selection, there are merely two documentaries, both out of competition. None are in Un Certain Regard or the Special Screenings sections, and instead, as usual, shore up the retrospective and cinephilic Cannes Classics sidebar. Between the independent events, there is only one doc, in Directors’ Fortnight, with none appearing in International Critics’ Week. A rundown of all of these follows:
The highest profile nonfiction selection does have the honor of screening as the festival’s closing night film, ICE AND THE SKY (pictured), about long-time glaciologist Claude Lorius, by Luc Jacquet, the director of MARCH OF THE PENGUINS. Also screening in the Official Selection, albeit in the Midnight Projections sidebar, is the Amy Winehouse biography, AMY, by Asif Kapadia, the director of SENNA.
As noted above, the remainder of Cannes’ docs are part of Cannes Classics, which annually presents a series of restored films and tributes, bolstered by new docs about filmmakers and films, some in conjunction with those retrospective offerings. Among the latter are Stig Björkman’s INGRID BERGMAN, IN HER OWN WORDS, part of this year’s tribute to the iconic actress; two docs celebrating Orson Welles’ centenary, Elisabeth Kapnist’s ORSON WELLES, SHADOWS AND LIGHT and Clara Kuperberg and Julia Kuperberg’s THIS IS ORSON WELLES (pictured); and Jason Silverman and Samba Gadjigo’s Sundance title SEMBENE!, which accompanies a screening of the African auteur’s restored BLACK GIRL. The festival also presents a completely self-referential documentary, a 70 minute celebration of the 60th anniversary of its main prize, the Palme d’Or, which I can’t imagine anyone choosing to attend.
The remainder of the doc offerings in Cannes Classics offer looks at celebrated filmmakers and actors: Kent Jones’ HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT, an adaptation and expansion of the interviews between the two auteurs; John McKenna and Gabriel Clarke’s STEVE MCQUEEN: THE MAN & LE MANS (pictured), about the screen star’s obsession with making a film about the legendary car race; Nancy Buirski’s BY SIDNEY LUMET, an appreciation of the director drawing on interviews before his death; Daniel Raim’s HAROLD AND LILLIAN: A HOLLYWOOD LOVE STORY, about the unheralded creative partnership between a storyboard artist and film researcher; and Richard Melloul’s hour-long paean to the prolific French actor, DEPARDIEU GRANDEUR NATURE.
Finally, as indicated above, the Directors’ Fortnight features one last documentary feature: BEYOND MY GRANDFATHER ALLENDE, Marcia Tambutti Allende’s personal look back at her grandfather, Chilean President Salvador Allende, who was ousted from office by Pinochet’s military coup in 1973.
what (not) to doc 