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Spanish director Pedro Almodovar's latest thriller, "The Skin I Live In," had filmgoers fleeing the theater Thursday night at its gala premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, due to some aggressively violent and disturbing content. The film, which stars Antonio Banderas and budding actress Spanish actress Elena Anaya, focuses on a mad but brilliant surgeon (Banderas) who kidnaps a man who raped his daughter. The doctor's daughter killed herself from the grief and it drives him to take very drastic measures. This is where it gets complicated and disturbing. Banderas then gives the rapist a sex change and transplants his...

CANNES - PETER Fonda launched a four-letter attack on US President Barack Obama at the Cannes film festival on Wednesday, calling him a traitor over the handling of the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill. The star of the 1969 road movie Easy Rider was in Cannes for the premiere of The Big Fix by Rebecca and Josh Tickell, the only feature documentary in the official selection at the Cannes film festival this year. Fonda - a keen environmentalist and co-producer of the film which centres on the explosion of the BP oil rig Deepwater Horizon, the ensuing spill and...

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- "Of Gods and Men," the Cannes Film Festival grand prize-winning feature now debuting across the country, had a "monastic adviser" on the set to help faithfully depict the lives of the French monks whose story is at the heart of the movie. Henry Quinson, who lived for six years at a Cistercian monastery in France, knew two of the monks portrayed in the film. The subject matter is not typical for a movie: the lives of seven Trappist monks in turmoil-ridden Algeria in the mid-1990s. All seven were kidnapped in 1996 and ultimately beheaded. "It's very...

A monk in "Of Gods and Men" and the film's director Xavier Beauvois. Cannes, France, May 25, 2010 / 01:12 am (CNA).- At the end the prestigious 12-day Cannes Film Festival on Sunday, a film on a group of French monks who were martyred in Africa during the 1990s won the event's second highest honor.“Of Gods and Men,” a film by the French director Xavier Beauvois, centers around the true story of seven Cistercian monks who were taken hostage and murdered by Islamic fundamentalists in 1996. Though the monks were told to return to their native France, the group...

Hollywoodnews.com: Does anyone out there have access to a private plane? And if you do, would you be willing to let Lindsay Lohan borrow it? In a turn of events that is making an already sad story seem that much more pathetic, out-of-control celebrity Lohan begged friends and work associates for a private jet so she could return to Los Angeles from Cannes in time for her scheduled court date. For those who haven’t been paying attention (and God bless you, because it clearly means you have better things to do with your life), Lohan skipped town to promote...

She did it again! Aishwarya Rai impresses us a second time in a row. The Bollywood actress walked the red carpet at Cannes Film Festival for the “On Tour” Premiere.

lifenews.com - Printer Friendly Page© V2.0 - CJ Website Designwww.cj-design.comPro-Life Movie Based on Botched Abortion Will Play at Cannes Film Festival by Steven ErteltLifeNews.com Editor April 19, 2010 Email RSSPrint Cannes, France (LifeNews.com) -- A movie about a baby born alive after a failed abortion is set to premier at the upcoming Cannes Film Festival in May. The film "22 Weeks" tells the true story of a baby aborted alive in an Orlando, Florida abortion center in 2005 and director Ángel Soto has announced the 22-minute picture will air at the respected event.A woman named Angele sued an Orlando abortion...

Fox holds 'Wall Street' sequel Studio to release 'Money Never Sleeps' on Sept. 24 By PAMELA MCCLINTOCK With an invite from the Cannes Film Festival likely coming, 20th Century Fox is pushing back the release of Oliver Stone's "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" from April 23 to Sept. 24. Insiders say the film has a strong shot at being included in the fest, which runs May 12-23. Fox would not comment. The sequel returns Michael Douglas return in the role of Gordon Gekko, starring opposite Shia LaBeouf, Carey Mulligan and Josh Brolin. Stone's film picks up 23 years after his...

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie may be royalty in the showbiz world, but Bill Clinton showed who's really got the power in Cannes this morning. The former US president has completely 'taken over' the Hotel du Cap, where Brangelina normally stay when they are in the south of France. A source said: 'There's a complete lock-down of the hotel for 36 hours. Nobody is allowed anywhere near the hotel, its restaurant or bar while Bill is there. There's even an air block to stop helicopters flying over.' Mr Clinton is in Cannes to host an AIDS fundraiser dinner with Sharon...

Empty champagne bottles are already stacking up on Saturday afternoon at Nikki Beach, an exclusive bar on Cannes seafront where Mariah Carey and Eva Longoria Parker dined the night before. The alcohol's effect is all too evident as a crowd clad in garishly expensive designer clothes dances on the sand. Suddenly, a blonde woman jumps on to a table and cheers erupt as her boyfriend sprays a £350 magnum of Piper Heidsieck champagne over her already see-through white dress, which she promptly peels off, followed swiftly by her underwear. Onlookers whoop appreciatively as she writhes around wearing only a huge...

CANNES , France (AFP) – Oscar-winning director Ang Lee Saturday offered Cannes' glitzy festival-goers a message of "peace and love" with a warmly acclaimed movie on the iconic hippie Woodstock festival, vying for the Palme d'Or award. "It is the innocence of a young generation departing from the establishment and trying to find a fair way of living with people and with nature," Lee said of the 1969 festival that gathered half a million people for three days of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. "I think they planted the seed of some of what is happening today," the "Brokeback Mountain" 2005...

The Cannes Film Festival has kicked off, and as a result, we can look forward to an outstanding week of stunning couture gowns, bedazzling brilliance and some movie drama, of course. Another cutie was Elizabeth Banks, who wore a red shouldered Armani Privé Spring 2009 gown for her Up premiere.

As he prepares to step into the role of Doctor Who, Matt Smith is just months away from becoming a major star, continuously stalked by the paparazzi, Whovians, et al. But, for now, he is keeping a low profile in the French Riviera, as he promotes the short film Together, which opened Critics' Week at the Cannes Film Festival on Thursday. The 26-year-old star has bundles of charm. I am under strict instructions not to ask questions about the new series of Doctor Who (his agent hovers close by, growling), so I try a leftfield approach: No, he did not...

May 27, 2004 | Filmmaker Michael Moore filmed an interview with American Nicholas Berg in the course of producing his documentary film "Fahrenheit 9/11" before Berg left for Iraq, where he was taken hostage and killed, Moore confirmed to Salon in a statement Thursday. The 20 minutes of footage does not appear in the final version of "Fahrenheit 911," according to the statement. Word of the footage reached Salon through a source unaffiliated with Moore or his film "Fahrenheit 9/11," which is reported to feature stark images of U.S. civilians and soldiers grappling with conditions in war-torn Iraq, as well...

Cannes' Voyage to Neverland By Yervand KocharDuring the 1963 Moscow International Film Festival, few had a doubt that Federico Fellini’s “8 ½� was not just a masterpiece but a milestone achievement that will signal a new epoch in filmmaking. The film was not merely contending for the Grand Prize; it was clear that no conventional prize can put a tag on the sheer artistic genius and refreshing power of the movie. Threatened by Fellini’s highly formalistic language, the Communist party’s movie department that was behind making the decisions of the festival, as usually, suspected something potentially harmful for the cause...

Telegraph - Print Version Sean Penn warns Barack Obama at Cannes Film Festival opening By Anita Singh, Showbusiness Editor Last updated: 8:05 PM BST 14/05/2008 The Cannes Film Festival got off to a lively start with Sean Penn, president of this year's jury, sounding off about US Presidential hopeful Barack Obama and the opening movie almost being upstaged by a bunch of performing pandas. Penn joined fellow judge Natalie Portman on the red carpet for the premiere of the first night film, Blindness, a thriller starring Julianne Moore. At a press conference beforehand, the actor, an outspoken critic of the...

Jack Black, master thespianwhat's goin on with this ensemble? short pantsuit = little Hillary?Richie HavensJulianne Mooreand this year's President of the Jury, that's right, your friend and mine, Jeff Spicoli.

Moore fears film seizure after Cuba trip NEW YORK (Reuters) - Filmmaker Michael Moore has stashed a copy of his latest documentary in Canada because he fears the U.S. government will try to confiscate it after part of it was filmed during an unauthorized trip to Cuba. The U.S. Treasury Department is investigating Moore's trip to communist Cuba in March to film part of his documentary, "SiCKO," which takes a swipe at the U.S. health-care system and is due to be released in U.S. theaters on June 29. U.S. citizens are generally barred from going to Cuba, unless approved by...

Bucharest, Romania (LifeNews.com) -- The Romanian film "4 months, 3 weeks, 2 days" portrays the plight of a student trying to get an illegal abortion in the days Communists controlled the country. The film won the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival but media portrayals of the victory say nothing of how abortion has become a means of birth control there. After the fall of communism, one of the first acts of the new leadership in Romania in 1990 was to legalize abortion.As doctors learned they could make money from selling abortions to women, they encouraged the practice and...

CANNES, France - "Sicko," Michael Moore's attack on the U.S. health care system, got a warm welcome at Cannes Saturday that marked the director's triumphant return to the film festival and a respite from the controversy his work has started at home. More than 2,000 people applauded loudly after the film's first Cannes screening at the packed Grand Theatre Lumiere, the main festival auditorium. "I know the storm awaits me back in the United States," said Moore as he absorbed the enthusiastic response of critics and journalists. The movie doesn't open until late June, but it has already been criticized...

Leonardo DiCaprio has been fighting to save the world from climate change — but the star's neighbours claim it is he who is wrecking their environment. The Departed actor — who will debut his environmentalist call to action film The 11th Hour at Cannes next week — is being taken to task in court for allegedly undermining and trashing the garden of his neighbours' multi-million dollar mansion. DiCaprio is being sued for "maliciously" crossing onto a neighbouring couple's property while renovating his Hollywood Hills home — cutting and removing hedges, excavating earth and bedrock which the couple claims destabilised their...

A classmate of mine has had a short film accepted for the Cannes Film Festival, and is raffling off a Wii to finance his accomodations. His name is Dave Footman, and here is his message: ************************************************************ Hello my friends, I wanted to give you the official "Foots Update" news. Since I hit the Big 5-0 in January I have been a traveling man (insert Ricky Nelson song here). I was asked to go to Australia and work with a good friend, producer/writer/director Natalie Hechtman, on her short film, Courting Hope. I'm happy and proud to report that the film looks...

AS THE FINAL credits rolled for Sofia Coppola's new candy-colored teen-dream film fantasy about history's most notorious poor little rich girl, "Marie-Antoinette," the audience at the Palais du Festival began to hiss like a box of snakes. And then they booed. Booing at the Cannes film festival, at a screening before an audience of a thousand international movie critics and film writers, is never a pleasant way for a director to start the day. While no one in the mob was shouting "Off with her head," the European press couldn't resist the pun. "At Cannes, Marie-Antoinette Guillotined," declared a 24-hour...

When there is a new outrage, I have to download some of my existing outrages, to make room. -- Al Gore CANNES, France -- What he wants you to know is that he has not made a political film. Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" tries to move outside politics and focus on the facts of global warming. Gore says those facts are established, the returns are in, there is almost unanimous scientific agreement about them, and we may have about 10 years before the earth reaches a tipping point from which it cannot recover. He has been traveling the world...

Directors at the Cannes film festival this year say they are using radical images of sex to challenge mainstream pornography and its widespread availability on the Internet. -snip- He said that the United States had a puritanical view of sex which turned it into an issue in young people's minds. In one particularly provocative scene in his film, three gay men engage in a sex session while singing "The Star-Spangled Banner". -snip-

The United States has an "obsession" with power and is making mistakes in the way it pressures other countries to cooperate in its "war on terror", a leading Mexican director said at the Cannes film festival. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu made the jabs during the presentation of his film, "Babel", which itself provides subtle criticism of the US. "There is an obsession in the United States today... about, you know, showing the power but at the same time having the fear of the other," he said. He claims that a sort of xenophobia has crept into US security policy in the...

CANNES, France - Oliver Stone presented a 25-minute preview at the Cannes Film Festival of his upcoming “World Trade Center,” promising an agonizing portrait of courage, camaraderie and perseverance. Stone, who introduced the footage that was shown Sunday night before a 20th anniversary screening of his Vietnam saga “Platoon,” said that war film and his Sept. 11 drama both deal with working-class heroes, not superhuman deeds. “It seems like the Vietnam War, Watergate, Iraq, all these things get built up, 9/11, into mythologies,” Stone told The Associated Press. “This is about what it was like at ground zero.” “World Trade...

Former Vice President of the United States Al Gore is seen during a press conference for the film 'An Inconvenient Truth,' at the 59th International film festival in Cannes, southern France, on Saturday, May 20, 2006. (AP Photo/Laurent Emmanuel)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - American director Oliver Stone and British producer John Daly plan to make a film about the 2002 coup that briefly brought down Venezuela's government, President Hugo Chavez said Sunday. Chavez said Stone and Daly plan to announce the upcoming film at the Cannes Film Festival in France. He added that the two called Venezuela Sunday morning to discuss their plans. "They've asked for our permission to announce it today in Cannes, and we've told them yes, that we're interested in that film being made," Chavez said during his weekly television and radio program.

The United States is emerging from a "bubble of unreality" about the problem of global warming, former Vice President Al Gore said Saturday at the Cannes Film Festival. Gore was in Cannes to promote the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth," which chronicles his efforts to bring the dangers of climate change to greater attention. "I think that up until fairly recently the United States has been in a bubble of unreality where global warming is concerned," he said, speaking before the Cannes premiere of the film, which debuted at last winter's Sundance Film Festival and opens in U.S. theaters Wednesday. Gore...

A US film featuring actors performing real sex is a "call to arms" against President George W. Bush, the director told journalists at the Cannes film festival. "Shortbus," an explicit, largely improvised arthouse flick that includes a rendition of the American national anthem during a gay sex scene, is a direct provocation, director John Cameron Mitchell admitted. "It's a little bit of a cri de coeur to us, a little bit of a call to arms" against the prevailing conservatism, he told a media conference, adding that his country was living in "the era of Bush, which is about clamping...

Cannes-Last night, Cannes Film Festival hosted the world premiere of The Da Vinci Code movie. Never was a debut so globally hyped. Never was a movie so awaited; never was excitement globally greater.

Cannes, France (AHN) - As "The Da Vinci Code" makes its worldwide film debut, opening the Cannes Film Festival, the critics are giving it the thumbs down. The highly anticipated drama was screened Tuesday night at the 59th Cannes Film Festival for hundreds of journalists from around the world against a backdrop of anger from religious groups. The movie is receiving some praise, but most is highly critical. One reviewer even calls Tom Hanks' performance "wooden." Only co-star Ian McKellen was left without criticism. One scene during the film, meant to be serious, elicited prolonged laughter from the audience. There...

Early critics seemed happy to try to break "The Da Vinci Code." Reaction ranged from halfhearted admiration to boredom to derision among journalists at the first press screening of the Ron Howard-Tom Hanks blockbuster in waiting, premiering Wednesday at the Cannes Film Festival and opening worldwide through Friday. "`Da Vinci' never rises to the level of a guilty pleasure. Too much guilt. Not enough pleasure," wrote critic Kirk Honeycutt in the trade paper The Hollywood Reporter.

Jeers, hisses and laughter was not "Canned", and what must have been a real disappointment for Tom Hanks who always looks surprised because of his facelift. The movie "The DaVinci Code", which is based upon a fictional story about how Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a child, takes two and a half hours to finish, but only thirty minutes to put a number of the audience to sleep, only to be awakened by laughter, where laughter is not appropriate or planned.According to reports some people walked out during the movie's closing minutes, and when the credits rolled there...

Quotes from early reviews of "The DaVinci Code" at Cannes:"CANNES, France - "The Da Vinci Code" drew lukewarm praise, shrugs of indifference, some jeering laughter and a few derisive jabs Tuesday from arguably the world's toughest movie crowd: critics at the Cannes Film Festival.""One especially melodramatic line uttered by Hanks drew prolonged laughter and some catcalls, and the audience continued to titter for much of the film's remainder. Some people walked out during the movie's closing minutes, though there were fewer departures than many Cannes movies provoke among harsh critics. When the credits rolled, there were a few whistles and...

Iranian film-maker Abbas Kiarostami has been honoured at Switzerland's Locarno film festival as "the greatest director in contemporary Iranian film-making". Organisers gave Kiarostami its Leopard of Honour, referring to him as "one of the great names in film". He won the festival's prestigious Bronze Leopard in 1989 for Where is the Friend's Home? His 1997 film Taste of Cherry won the Palme D'Or at Cannes. The 10-day Locarno film festival ends on 13 August. Clashed with censors Unlike many Iranian filmmakers who fled following the 1979 Islamic revolution, Kiarostami has stayed in Iran, often saying he felt he made his...

CANNES, FRANCE - Twelve months after Michael Moore scooped Cannes' top award with "Fahrenheit 9/11," - a scathing indictment of the Bush adminstration's handling of the war in Iraq - a very different movie director screened a very different view of the war at the world's premier cinematic gathering. Director Hiner Saleem did not win the Golden Palm this year. But his film "Kilometre Zero" created a good deal of buzz at the competition, which closed on Saturday, not least because of its final scene. "We're free! We're free!" two Iraqi Kurdish exiles shout exultantly as they hear the news...

It is arguable that the most famous line in “Revenge of the Sith” comes from Padme Amidala. When Palpatine announces to a rapturous Senate that the Republic is to be re-organised as the first Galactic Empire, she says: "So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause”. We are supposed to infer from this statement that freedom has been traded for security, and democracy traded for a dictatorship. As such, it is supposed to be a dark day, a tragedy, one which will take 20 years and the original three films to remedy. However the question that no one asks...

CANNES, FRANCE – Twelve months after Michael Moore scooped Cannes' top award with "Fahrenheit 9/11," - a scathing indictment of the Bush adminstration's handling of the war in Iraq - a very different movie director screened a very different view of the war at the world's premier cinematic gathering. Director Hiner Saleem did not win the Golden Palm this year. But his film "Kilometre Zero" created a good deal of buzz at the competition, which closed on Saturday, not least because of its final scene. "We're free! We're free!" two Iraqi Kurdish exiles shout exultantly as they hear the news...

Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi poses during red carpet arrivals for U.S. director Tommy Lee Jones' in-competition film "Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada" at the 58th Cannes Film Festival May 20, 2005. (Reuters)

ON SOME nights, deep into the wee hours, the myth and reality of the Cannes Film Festival party scene merge into one surreal dreamscape. Or one nightmare, if you think Cannes is supposed to just be about great films, thoughtful directors and dedicated actors. Thursday night was one of those nights. There was a party at the former Palm Beach Casino at the Pointe de la Croisette, home of some wicked bashes at past festivals. I have no idea what the theme or reason for the fete was. And there were no clues inside. But the "hosts" were to be...

The Cannes Film Festival is no stranger to political statements, especially in the wake of last year's "Fahrenheit 9/11," the Bush-bashing film by Michael Moore. This year, a Danish moviemaker is on the attack against President Bush, calling him an "a--hole," and saying America is "sitting on the world."

Alvy, founder of PABAAH.com, is slated to appear on "ABC World News Tonite with Peter Jennings" tonite(Wednesday 5/18/05 6:30PM EST). Topic: Reaction to George Lucas and his anti-Americanism at the Cannes Film Festival and subsequent boycott of all things Lucas. Perhaps Mr. Lucas can cite one freedom he's lost?

CANNES -- Star Wars is a wakeup call to Americans about the erosion of democratic freedoms under George W. Bush, filmmaker George Lucas says. Lucas, responding to a question from The Sun at a Cannes Film Festival press conference on Sunday, said he first wrote the framework of Star Wars in 1971 when reacting to then-U.S. president Richard Nixon and the on-going events of the Vietnam War. But the story still has relevance today, he said, and is part of a pattern he has noticed in his readings of history. "I didn't think it was going to get quite this...

AP) All those "Star Wars" geeks, who've been waiting for weeks outside movie theaters with their Yoda sleeping bags and their homemade lightsabers, finally have a film that's worthy of their perseverance. The Force is strong with "Episode III — Revenge of the Sith," the sixth and final piece in George Lucas' galactic saga, which represents a welcome return to the ideas and the spirit that made his original "Star Wars" a pop-culture juggernaut 28 years ago. The circle is now complete, as Lucas' characters are fond of saying, and much of the film's joy comes from watching these familiar...

Revenge of the Republicans Star Wars' Lucas draws parallels between U.S. politics and rise of the Empire CANNES -- Star Wars is a wake-up call to Americans about the erosion of democratic freedoms under George W. Bush, George Lucas said yesterday. Lucas, responding to a question at a Cannes Film Festival press conference, said he first wrote the framework of Star Wars in 1971 when reacting to then U.S. president Richard Nixon and the on-going events of the Vietnam War. But the story still has relevance today, he said, and is part of a pattern he has noticed in his...

By Erik Kirschbaum CANNES, France (Reuters) - The dark underside of the United States has taken center stage in several films at Cannes this year, capped on Monday with a scathing attack of past and present racism in America by Danish director Lars von Trier. Von Trier, whose fear of flying has prevented him from visiting the United States, won thunderous cheers at the world premiere and a news conference, where he said he enjoyed bashing America on screen because it invades his life even in Denmark. "We are all under the influence -- and it's a very bad influence...

STAR WARS director George Lucas brushed off critics of the last three installments of his genre-defining series last night as he attended the glittering world premiere for Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith in Cannes.Critics have hailed his new film as a vast improvement on the first two prequels, but Lucas said he paid little heed. "I see it all as one movie and I don’t pay much attention to whether people like one chapter or another," he said. "We have two fan bases - the over-25s and the under-25s. The over-25 fan base is loyal to the...

CANNES, France For some Europeans, George Lucas' latest "Star Wars" film is invoking comparisons to today's political climate. Audiences viewing "Episode Three -- Revenge of the Sith" at the Cannes Film Festival are comparing the story of Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side and the rise of an emperor through warmongering to President Bush's war on terrorism and the invasion of Iraq. Among the lines they cite is when Anakin tells former mentor Obi-Wan Kenobi "If you're not with me, then you're my enemy." After the Nine-Eleven attacks, Bush said, "Either you are with us, or you are with...