Quiet year at Cannes

Sebu has resurfaced with some disappointing news about this year's lineup at the Cannes Film Festival.

"Not a single film from Southeast Asia among the two competitive sections (official selection and un certain regard)," Sebu notes.

Cambodia's Rithy Panh will have his latest film, The Artists of the Theatre Brule, screened in the major section, but "out of competition".

The new showcase, Tous les Cinemas du Monde, will present some Filipino cinema and Som Ock Southiphonh, a Laotian filmaker, was picked by Cinefondation, a Paris-based Cannes film academy, in "l'atelier du festival" program, to help him finding financial support for his project, Sebu says.

"Anyway," writes Sebu, "the Tom Yum Goong gang is probably about to invade the Croisette and may make huge deal in the film market and the La Quinzaine des Realisateurs (Cannes off-section) line-up will be unveiled next Tuesday."

Indeed, after last year, with Tropical Malady and Old Boy winning major prizes, this year's lineup seems to have shifted away from Asia.

This year will feature the directorial debut of Tommy Lee Jones, the second part of a trilogy by Lars von Trier and the first entry by Wim Wenders in eight years. Not to mention Star Wars Episode III being screened out of competition.

In addition to von Trier's Manderlay'; Jones's The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada; there will be Sin City (which has yet to open in Thailand), David Cronenberg's A History of Violence, Broken Flowers by Jim Jarmusch and starring Bill Murray and Sharon Stone and Last Days, a Gus Van Sant film about a Kurt Cobain-like rock star holed up in his house during his final 72 hours.

(Cross-published at Rotten Tomatoes)