One of the most anticipated features at Cannes this year is Jacques Audiard's return to the Croisette with "Rust & Bone," an adaptation of Craig Davidson's short story starring Marion Cotillard and Matthias Schoenaerts. The last time the helmer was here for "A Prophet," he earned immense critical acclaim for himself and his film's star, Tahar Rahim, leading to the film's eventual Oscar-nomination in the Foreign Film category. From the sounds of our review this morning, "Rust & Bone" is another huge success for both the director and his lead actress.
Marion Cotillard is set to continue her amazing run of collaborations (which includes Audiard, husband Guillaume Canet, Chris Nolan, James Gray, Steven Soderbergh and Woody Allen), now teaming with Iranian helmer Asghar Farhadi, hot off his Oscar-winning family drama "A Seperation." Details about the film are being kept under wraps, but the project will be Farhadi's first shoot outside Iran, and is being described as an "emotional social thriller" in the vein of 'A Separation,' with multiple twists aimed at keeping the audience in suspense from the first frame to the last.
Farhadi added that he hopes to “present the viewers of my films with questions rather than answers; something the world needs more than ever today. Posing new questions to old answers. Perhaps this cinema can be named an inquiring cinema.” Lensing will begin this fall on an €11 million budget with Alexander Mallet-Guy producing through his Memento Films shingle.
One of the films that was up against Farhadi's "A Separation" at the Oscars earlier this year was Belgian entry "Bullhead," which — funnily enough — was led by Cotillard's "Rust & Bone" leading man Schoenaerts. The actor put in a sublime performance, raising the somewhat pulpy tale with his turn as a mafia muscle with a dark past. The actor has already been touted as this year's Jean Dujardin and, in fact, when Cotillard last spoke with French mag Obsession, she revealed that Michael Mann wrote to her the day after seeing "Rust & Bone," calling Schoenaerts "quite a revelation."
Cotillard also had kind words to say about the actor, noting that working with other actors during reshoots of "The Dark Knight Rises" after Audiard's film made her "appreciate how this guy is one of the most magnetic actors with whom [she's] worked with." It probably doesn't need to be said now that we've pumped him up this much, but Schoenaerts is definitely one to watch for the future.
For now, though, the actor has lined up a role in Hans Herbots' thriller "The Treatment." An adaptation of Mo Hayder's bestselling novel, the story follows detective Jack Caffrey as he jumps on a case of a missing 8-year-old boy that leads him on a heartbreaking and gripping tour de force of suspense. Generic comparisons are made to 'Silence Of The Lambs' and "Seven," though hopefully there's a little more to it than that. No start date has been named.
As we mentioned, "Rust & Bone" premieres today at the Croisette and will be released later this year stateside through Sony Pictures Classics. Cotillard and Schoenaerts are also reuniting for Guillaume Canet's currently lensing "Blood Ties," which should be unveiled sometime this fall as well. [ScreenDaily/ScreenDaily]