Common sense would tell you that the last person you’d expect to bad mouth the Cannes Film Festival would be someone who’s had great success at the French event. But then again, you probably weren’t thinking about filmmaker James Gray.
For those not familiar with Gray, the writer-director debuted 2013 film “The Immigrant” during the main competition at the Cannes Film Festival. That film would go on to receive critical acclaim as it competed for the coveted Palme d’Or. However, recently at the Marrakech Film Festival, Gray reminisced about his time at Cannes and what he thinks about the fest (and film festivals in general), and surprisingly, he was not very complimentary.
READ MORE: The Essentials: The Films of James Gray
“The critical establishment [of Cannes] is stuck in 1968. (…) They are protectors of the status quo,” said Gray (via Variety).
He continued to explain his thoughts by showing why “The Immigrant” did what it did at Cannes in the year it premiered. “‘The Immigrant’ was different from the all the other movies in competition that year. I’m not saying ‘The Immigrant’ is good, but it was me trying to do Puccini in a field where they were all trying to still do 1968,” said the filmmaker.
He continued, “I think people mistake form for content.(…) That’s a problem with these festivals. They want something on a surface taking big risks.”
Moving on from his disdain for the festival circuit, particularly at Cannes, Gray talked about his highly-anticipated new film “Ad Astra,” which stars Brad Pitt. Many believed the film could be a late addition to this year’s awards season, but it appears that Gray’s sci-fi epic is still a distant though, as he’s knee-deep in post-production, with more than 600 shots left to review.
“We’re far from finished,” said Gray. “I’ve been very insistent because I didn’t want to be up against a release date.” The film has already been pushed back from its winter 2019 release to May 2019. Many speculated the move was so that the film could have a big debut at Cannes. But with comments like what’s above, we’re not sure if that’s happening anytime soon.
READ MORE: James Gray’s ‘Ad Astra’ Moves To May 2019, Conveniently Following Cannes
His reason for taking time on “Ad Astra” is because Gray doesn’t want his film to feel unfinished, as he says that “science fiction films (often) have a number of shots that don’t look very good.”
Lastly, Gray was asked about his thoughts on Netflix, which ties back to the whole Cannes argument. In his explanation, the filmmaker brings up Martin Scorsese, who is still working on his Netflix film “The Irishman.”
“Filmmakers are hostages of the situation. I don’t blame (Scorsese) at all. I would do it in a second if (Netflix) gave me the money,” said Gray.
As of now, the director doesn’t require Netflix’s sizable bank account for a film to get produced. But it sounds like if that’s what it takes, Gray is down to jump to streaming and obviously, he wouldn’t care about the film festival implications of that deal.