I've been sorely neglectful of my blog, and I was basically told in a nice way that I had better get on with it, so here goes, and I won't bore anyone with a political tirade this time… I guess going to Cannes (the festival of festivals, to which I'm thrilled to be at, but nonetheless does come with some baggage. A sort of 'yellow' baggage).
My immediate lead-up to leaving for Cannes was not one of my more brilliant moves. I partied-down pretty decently Sunday night at the closing night party for the Tribeca Film Festival at the Embassy Suites hotel in downtown Manhattan, then proceeded to stay out further with my friend David at the Tribeca Cinemas. Luckily I packed earlier that afternoon, because I arrived home pretty damn late (but I can honestly say I at least didn't close the place).
Anyway, I was, up at 8:20am to get into the office to finish up two rather big stories I had running in indieWIRE that week (plus other miscellaneous work to do) before leaving for JFK (late) to go to France on our 7pm flight. The plane was packed, but we managed to rearrange the seating with some French dude who didn't speak English so I could sit with Eugene Hernandez (the French will have their revenge no doubt soon). Luckily we ate at Chili's in the terminal prior to take off, because the food was a complete joke! Eug fell asleep listening to his iPod, and I nearly dozed off, but…. this really loud American guy four rows behind me was having a vociferous gab fest with the dude next to him, which pretty much kept me up until the sun started coming up. Then he fell asleep, and I was awake again.
We landed at Nice Cote d'Azure Airport around 9am. Eug and I had a bet on when we'd actually get into our place in Cannes. I said 12pm, but he thought I was being a bit cynical. (I won). The Festival de Cannes was kind enough to shuttle journalists in from the airport furnished with cars from Renault, one of the many big sponsor here. The driver wore a uniform, and was very pleasant. He even looked a bit like Jacques Chirac – at least around the eyes I thought as I stared at him through his rear-view mirror sitting in the backseat in my exhaustive haze. Anyway, Chirac dropped us off near it main event facility, the Palais des Festivals.
Since we were in front of the accreditation office, Eug decided to go in to get his pass while I watched the luggage. He came out with a little smile on his face because he received a "Rose" badge. Here at Cannes, the press badges are assigned according to how the festival deems an individual's relative importance. The Brahmin of passes is the "White" or carte blanche badge, only given to a relatively few elite. These holders can basically just show up and be whisked into any Palais competition press screening through the center door while everyone else "ooos and awwwes." Below that level is the Rose badge (with a sub-category of a rose colored badge with a yellow dot that distinguishes them from the "main-line" roses, but still a tad below carte blanche). These people also number relatively few in the pecking order of 4,000 registered Festival de Cannes journalists (compare this number to Toronto or Sundance which have like 500 to maybe a 1000 or so). Anyway, at crowded press screenings, like this morning's "Mala Educacion," the carte blanches went in up the red carpet (they're still checked by the tight security though), then the Rose badges.
After Rose are the Blue pass holders. This category forms the sort of mid-level press badge, the middle class "masses," a rather not so silent majority. Such is the importance of the colored badges, that journalists on our flight to Nice were already anticipating their color, with about a dozen of them complaining about the blue badge as being "impossible to do anything with." If one's schedule doesn't allow for showing up 40 minutes prior to an anticipated screening, the late Blues risk being left out of the screening or getting crappy seats. And just forget trying to get into an anticipated news conference with Tarantino and the jury, or opening night director Pedro Almodovar. It's the outside monitors for you Blueman!
There is, however, much more dreaded then the Blue…. The maligned Yellow badge. This is really the bottom of the barrel of press badges. While waiting for Eug to reemerge from the Accreditation office, one person came outside to his friends with a sharp, "F**K! A yellow badge." Despite my exhaustion after the flight and having not slept a real night's sleep in days, I just had to see what badge I'd get. Well, I'm sure anyone who's reading this can see where my story is going… I definitely won't be getting laid here on the Cote d'Azure by waiving my badge around showing off my place in the food chain. I did, however, manage to get into the second screening of "Mala educacion" this afternoon after waiting for 40 min. in the rain. The carte blanches (who also get in the press conferences first and always) entered first, then the Roses, then Blues… All were lined up according to signs that explained where to queue up by color.
For my particular screening, the Yellows did not actually have a sign explaining where to wait, which caused some confusion among us, but the Yellows began to queue up anyway at some point, and I did get in. Thank God! And I really did enjoy the movie. Gael is great. The story is much more layered then I had imagined, and Almodovar continues his banner irreverence in this one. Eug, who saw the film at the packed early morning screening, decided to go in for a second round with me in the afternoon. He said he'd save me a seat when he entered the Palais on the ground floor since the large theater didn't seem to be too crowded, since this was the day's second showing. When the Yellows were let in, I went through security (metal wands, followed by an inspection of any bags). I don't speak French, but the ushers indicated we had to go to the balcony (as in a rope cordoning off every area other then the path to the stairs to the balcony with a half-dozen ushers lining the way indicated as such). I saw Eug in the foyer beyond the rope, and yelled over that we were being herded up to the balcony, so he decided to just join me. We assumed the bottom level was completely full, hence the one-way ticket upstairs…
But, NOPE! The Yellows are not allowed to sit on the ground level, even if seats are available. The bottom was probably only about 40% full at best, but no matter. Empty air is preferable in filling ground-level seats to any of us nasty-ass Yellows. And ushers were placed at all ground level entries throughout the entire screening just in case any of us rebellious Yellows got any fancy ideas. Apparently at the packed morning screening of the movie, Whites and Reds filled the entire bottom level. At 10:30am the movie promptly began as scheduled, despite the fact that the Blues (sorry Blues) and a spattering of Yellows were just beginning to be allowed in. Well, no one ever promised that Egalite was a part of the Festival de Cannes.
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We've spent $400 billion on a war that's a lie, 45 million Americans don't have health insurance and poverty is rising in the U.S. But, who am I? Some kind of bore? What about Star Jones being fired from "The View?" Well, I don't plead to be 100% political... Since being in Los Angeles covering the LA Film Festival and having access to free wireless Internet in my hotel room at the new Angeleno, I've indulged in some great morning television while working. Bring on the fluff and the cultural diversions!!!
