After an up-and-down festival where the winners were impossible for even the most sagacious bookie to call, the Cannes Film Festival jury last night gave the coveted Palme D'Or to a closely observed drama about illegal immigrants. Dheepan, which was gripping, subtly detailed and remarkably unpredictable given that it dealt with a subject of daily headlines, was directed by French favourite Jacques Audiard.
The biggest surprise, however, was the decision to share the award for best actress between Emmanuelle Bercot and Rooney Mara, snubbing crowd-favourite Cate Blanchett.
Rooney Mara plays the shop assistant who falls for elegant Carol, played by Blanchett, in Todd Haynes's film of the same name. Carol was the first real festival hit; in a year with an unusually strong showing of female protagonists and great feminine performances, Blanchett was widely expected to scoop the prize.
Her character, a wealthy wife torn between her real longings and the pretence of respectability she must maintain to keep custody of her daughter in 1950s America, unquestionably drives the drama. That Mara won the award in her more passive role is simply more proof, as if any were needed, of the singularity of Cannes.
Before the festival began 12 days ago, Audiard was marked as a favourite for the Palme D'or; he had previously won the Grand Prix for his prison drama The Prophet in 2009. Once the competition was under way, however, critical favour started to slip between the Chinese entrants – Hou Hsiao-hsien's The Assassin and Jia Zhangke's Mountains May Depart – and the more stylistically daring Europeans, Yorgos Lanthimos's The Lobster and Oscar-winner Paolo Sorrentino's Youth, with Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel as two elderly artists facing the gloomy reality of their fading powers.
This is what Cannes can do so well. As the debonair Audiard ascended the stage to receive the prize from the jury's joint presidents, Joel and Ethan Coen, he was flanked by his leading actors Anronyrhasan Jesurhasan and Kalieaswari Srinivasan.
Jesurhasan was a Tamil activist who, in real life, came to France from Sri Lanka in the hope of gaining political asylum. A Tamil refugee sharing the stage with the Coens and a jury studded with stars: it was a very Cannes moment.
First-time film-maker Laszlo Nemes from Hungary was also a hitherto unknown but definite contender with Son of Saul, set in a Nazi work camp and shot in a claustrophobic way that made this familiar subject feel like a fresh hell. Then, late in the festival, two more outstanding works meant the cards were once more tossed in the air: Justin Kurzel's Macbeth and young Mexican film-maker Michel Franco's Chronic, with Tim Roth as a carer for terminally ill patients who is also nursing some demons of his own.
The jury chose to reward Chinese slow cinema doyen Hou Hsiao-hsien with the best director prize for The Assassins, his visually lush take on a martial arts story. Chronic collected the award for best script. The Lobster, set in an indeterminate future where anyone uncoupled who fails to find a new partner is turned into an animal by the powers-that-be, won the Jury Prize. Son of Saul which, of all the films in competition, was the only one that reliably rendered audiences speechless, won the Grand Prix – an extraordinary achievement for a debut film.
Best actress prize-winner Bercot gives an emotionally knife-edge performance as an abused wife in a passionate but destructive relationship opposite Vincent Cassel in Maiwenn's Mon Roi, one of two films by women in the 19-strong competition. (Bercot also directed the out-of-competition opening night film Stand Tall.)
The event that drew the biggest cheer – apart from the arrival on stage of the Coen brothers; Cannes loves its auteurs far more than any mere star – was the announcement of the best actor prize. French actor Vincent Lindon deservedly won this for his portrayal of a middle-aged skilled tradesman trying to rebuild his life after being retrenched in Stephane Brize's The Measure of a Man. Both the actor and his director were weeping as he stood to come to the stage and so, too, were many in the audience by the time he had hugged each member of the jury in gratitude.
And how singular it is. Because despite the apparently diminished interest from the big American players in choosing Cannes as a showcase, despite encroachment from the vast Toronto festival in September, despite the frequently weird choices of programme, despite the fact that there is a lot more commerce than art happening at any given moment out on the Croisette – despite everything, in fact, the Cannes film festival remains the greatest cinema event in the world. As host Lambert Wilson said at the end of the brisk closing ceremony, we'll be back same time next year.
CANNES FILM FESTIVAL WINNERS 2015
Palme d'Or: Dheepan - French director Jacques Audiard
A thriller spotlighting the plight of Sri Lankan refugees, including a traumatised former insurgent, as they try to build new lives in France.
Grand Prize: Son of Saul - Hungarian director Laszlo Nemes
The 38-year-old Nemes's first feature, this movie was widely acclaimed for taking audiences into a Nazi concentration camp and showing the Holocaust in a different way.
Jury Prize: The Lobster - Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos
Starring a paunchy, deadpan Colin Farrell, The Lobster is a weird but well-received movie about single people who are transformed into animals if they don't find a mate.
Best actor: Vincent Lindon, The Measure of a Man
Talented, gruff French character actor Lindon scooped the prize for his performance as a laid-off factory worker desperately searching for a job.
Best actress: Rooney Mara (Carol), Emmanuelle Bercot (Mon Roi)
Mara won the award for her part in lesbian love affair Carol in which she co-starred with Cate Blanchett, while France's Emmanuelle Bercot was also awarded for her performance as a woman looking back on a destructive relationship with a deceitful but charming boyfriend.
Best director: Hou Hsiao-hsien, The Assassin
A leading figure in Taiwan's New Wave cinema, Hou won for his slow-burning minimalist drama featuring Asian megastar Shu Qi as a female assassin who, after failing in one mission, is sent back to her home province to kill its governor, who is also the man she loves.
Best screenplay: Chronic - Michel Franco
Mexican writer-director Franco won for his bleak film about an end-of-life nurse played by Tim Roth who grows too close to some of his patients and faces difficult moral choices about assisted suicide.
with AFP
