The #metoo movement has irreversibly changed the way we look at the film industry. No one would sign on to a Harvey Weinstein production, Kevin Spacey is unhirable and areas where women are missing are suspect – institutions like film festivals and award ceremonies are taking note. This year, the Berlin International Film Festival dedicated an entire retrospective section to women filmmakers and the New York’s Tribeca Film Festival saw an equal number of women and men represented as directors in their competition section. But as the world’s most prestigious film festival, Cannes sticks out for its lack of diversity and underwhelming attempts to modernise.
The festival is comprised of seven sections, with the competition section begin the category in which feature films are up for winning the coveted Palme d’Or prize – but this year, only four out of the 21 competition entries are by female directors. Among the women competing are French directors Mati Diop, Céline Sciamma and Justine Triet, with Atlantique (2019), Portrait de la Jeune Fille en Feu (2019), and Sibyl (2019), respectively, as well as Jessica Hausner from Austria with Little Joe (2019). While other categories, like Un Certain Regard, which focuses on new directors with fresh techniques and viewpoints, have better ratios with 42% female representation, there are no women directors in the festival’s Out of Competition Section, which showcases films that merit recognition but did not fit the strict criteria to compete for the Palme d’Or.
Another point of contention is welcoming back director Quentin Tarantino, who premieres his much-anticipated film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, after his Kill Bill leading lady, Uma Thurman, came forward with on-set mistreatment allegations. Meanwhile and equally questionable is the choice to grant French actor Alain Delon the honorary Palme d’Or, after he openly spoke about slapping women, opposed adoption for same-sex couples and maintained close ties to far right French politician Jean-Marie Le Pen of the Front National. In spite of the petition opposing the decision, which started in the United States, Cannes chief Thierry Frémaux said in a press conference on Monday that the festival would be honouring the actor with “100% enthusiasm.”
“We are not going to give Alain Delon the Nobel Peace Prize,” Frémaux said. “We’re giving him a Palme d’Or for his career as an actor.”
While the Cannes chief last year signed the 5050×2020 gender parity pledge after protests on the red carpet of the festival – an agreement which obligates signatories to reveal the gender statistics behind their board members and participants to promote equality – the actions of the festival seem to be living by the letter of the agreement and not the spirit of it.
France and its film industry, have often opposed US-led social justice movements, claiming that they are a foreign idea that does not apply to their society. When the #metoo movement took off in 2017, some 100 prominent French female artists and intellectuals, including famed actress Catherine Deneuve, responded with a controversial anti-#metoo manifesto published in the French daily Le Monde, criticising the movement for painting women as victims and tone policing.
Still, the empty director’s chair adorning this year’s festival stage, honouring of the late filmmaker Agnès Varda, who died in March, is a sign of hope alongside the inclusion of breastfeeding and baby changing tables (which should be everywhere). Also, we are dying to seeing Chloë Sevigny’s short film, White Echo, which is up for an award.