Halfway point at the Cannes Film Festival that after the Hollywood day for Baz Luhrmann's Elvis film, 12 minutes of applause and a Montee des Marches to remember with Elvis Presley's widow, the protagonists Austin Butler and Tom Hanks and the Maneskin phenomenon, it proposed three films in competition (only two are missing), the first prizes of the side sections and hosted the Rendez Vous with Mads Mikkelsen, the Danish actor awarded in 2012 for Il Sospetto.
The tenth day of the 75 / o edition began with the meeting with the protagonists of Elvis, Austin Butler who plays Presley and Tom Hanks in the role of the infamous impresario, Colonel Tom Parker.
Is a new star born in Hollywood?
There are those who bet on the thirty-year-old Butler, actor, singer, model.
"I spent two years of my life preparing for this role, trying to learn everything that could be done about him, I worked on the likeness, the hair, the style, the look and of course the movements in which Elvis was truly unique. , but what I wanted most of all was to bring out his special soul. I risked being obsessed with him to try to restore his humanity behind the rock icon we all know. "
If Butler remembers Elvis, Tom Hanks has completely transformed, almost unrecognizable, to play the manager who discovered him in 1955 as a very young white talent with gospel in his blood and the spiritual ecstasy of southern blacks.
Overweight, with a persuasive little voice and a mephistophelic look, Hanks is Elvis' maneuverer, who has managed almost his entire career with a commission of 50%, according to some, also responsible for his demise.
"I've never been afraid of the character, it's my job as an actor to put myself in someone else's shoes. What I did was not to judge him, but to interpret him, even in its nuances, on the border between good and evil that also belonged to him" , explained Hanks, two Oscars and a career studded with mostly kind, positive characters like in Forrest Gump or The Terminal to name two among the many.
"He was a scammer, a scoundrel with the habit of playing cards, but also a person with an extraordinary intuition.
The other protagonist of the day at Cannes was Mads Mikkelsen, the Danish actor who was, among other things, the face of Thomas Vintenberg's Another Round as well as villain for 007 in Casino Royale and having starred in Doctor Strange and Animals Fantastic: Dumbledore's Secrets (as Gellert Grindelwald instead of the uncomfortable Johnny Depp).
In America they see him as a villain and with this label he will also be in the still mysterious Indiana Jones antagonist of Harrison Ford.
In Cannes he said "I'm not really afraid of my characters. I don't feel intimidated but I am aware of the challenges".
And he has announced the next project in Europe: he will be a captain who, encouraged by the ambitious Danish king Frederik V, sets out to cultivate the inhospitable lands of Jutland in 1755, a historical drama entitled King '
For the competition, of the three films passed today, two stood out by entering among the possible prizes of the palmares on Saturday 28 May.
The poetic
BROKER
by the Japanese director who was already Palme d'Or with A Family Affair, Hirokazu Kore'eda on a trip to Korea who, with the structure of the road movie, tells a story of trafficking in children to talk to us once again about family and human relationships and in this case of the power of a newborn, magnet of affection and humanity that makes everyone better.
Protagonist Song Kang-ho, the Mr Kim of Parasite.
And the film by Belgian Lukas Dhont (who had made an exploit at Cannes with Girl in 2018, winning 4 awards)
CLOSE
, one of the many of this edition, with teenagers at the center.
The story, well shot and compelling, is the one on the edge of the ambiguity of two 13-year-old boys, Leo (Eden Dambrine) and Remy (Gustav De Waele), close friends as it is at that age, they share everything, mornings at school, afternoons between studies and entertainment and sometimes they even sleep at each other's house.
A closeness that at school they also make fun of, until a tragedy breaks the spell.
The evening is all for the amfAR glam gala, the traditional charity event during the Cannes festival to raise funds for the fight against AIDS: it is the night of the models, this year followed by influencers.
Sharon Stone auctioneer and Robert De Niro super guest.
Among the prizes awarded:
UN BEAU MATIN
by Mia Hansen-Love with Lea Seydoux won the Europa Cinemas Label, while the Grand Prix of the Semaine de la Critique went to LA JAURIA by Colombian Andres Ramirez Pulido.