That was something.
More than a moment of TV.
A very deep sense of humanity.
"Ladies and gentlemen, live from kyiv, the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky", launched the mistress of the Cannes Film Festival opening ceremony, Virginie Efira, this Tuesday, May 17, at 7:43 p.m.
Zelensky, an actor, it's true, originally.
Became an actor in history in the midst of war in Ukraine.
A total surprise, unexpected, of which nothing had filtered.
That was to say the importance of the biggest festival in the world, on France 2 for the first time, live from Cannes, but also from kyiv.
Words borrowed from Charlie Chaplin
The room froze to listen to the Ukrainian president evoke Charlie Chaplin's “Dictator”, enumerate the massacres in Boutcha or Mariupol in a calm sadness which imposed meditation.
He repeatedly quoted Charlot and "The Voice of Freedom", the power of cinema even when "Hitler, the dictator, did not lose immediately" while the film of the comic - as Zelensky was for a long time on Ukrainian television — made fun of the Nazi leader.
What emotion in these simple words borrowed from Charlot: “We lack tenderness and kindness”.
The thread of the speech, sometimes made difficult by the translation, was less important than seeing it in close-up, a life plan, a reminder that the Cannes Film Festival has always been committed, political.
More than ever for his 75th birthday.
"Cinema, this weapon of massive emotion"
Vincent Lindon, president of the jury, had moved, too, just before.
With his own seriousness: “I tried to write a text.
It's the only way I've found to manage to speak, that's it, "began the actor, who announced what was to follow without our knowing it, by evoking "the torments of a bleeding planet, which suffers and who burns in the indifference of the powers".
“I have often taken the risk of speaking loudly, sometimes naively”, to lend his voice to those who do not have one, he continued, adding: “It is our job”.
And celebrating “the cinema, this weapon of massive emotion”.
Speak loud and clear, this Tuesday evening at the Palais du Festival.
We had to have a little fun and Vincent Delerm had cheered up the room by asking him with his charming English to take over "Que je t'aime" by Johnny.
Emotion is also those little things in life.
These great moments that pass quickly: Pierre Lescure, for his last festival as president — that made three on the air!
— presenting an honorary Palme d'or to Forest Whitaker, an actor who grabs you with a blink of an eye with his enormous presence and poise.
To say that at 7 p.m., we were trying to describe Virginie Efira's diamond dress, which confirmed the decline of the neckline.
Finally, it was a specialist who entrusted it to us.
Futile and useful, since Cannes is also that, these candies, all these pink dresses from the rise of the steps, in all possible and un(imaginable) materials.
Virginie Efira immediately launched: “In the middle of our night, a note of hope resounds”.
Cannes, before glamour, is love.
