Day 7: AI Dubbing Debate; Big Deals M.I.A.; Denzel ❤️ Spike
Plus: Lauren Sánchez, Scarlett Johansson, the Screen Jury Grid update
Denzel Washington may not have been nominated for an Oscar this year for his virtuosic turn in Gladiator II, but Monday night at the Cannes Film Festival, he got a nice consolation prize. Taking advantage of the fact that Othello, in which he’s currently starring on Broadway alongside Jake Gyllenhaal, is dark on Monday nights, the actor jetted into Cannes for the day to attend the gala premiere of Spike Lee’s Highest 2 Lowest, in which he also stars.
But before the film, screening out of competition, could get underway, the festival’s Thierry Frémaux called Washington up to the stage to present him with an honorary Palme d’Or. That puts Washington in select company since there have only been 21 previous recipients — the most recent being Robert De Niro, who was feted on the opening night of this year’s festival.
“This is a total surprise for me, so I’m emotional,” Washington said. Referring to Lee and his new film, he continued, “It’s a great opportunity to collaborate with my brother once again, brother from another mother, and to be here once again in Cannes. We’re a very privileged group in this room that we get to make movies and wear tuxedos and nice clothes and dress up and get paid well for it as well. We’re just blessed beyond measure. I’m blessed beyond measure. From the bottom of my heart, I thank you all.”
And then it was on to the film, which Lee has called “a reinterpretation” of Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 police procedural High and Low, which in turn was based on Ed McBain’s 1959 novel King’s Ransom. In the movie — which A24 will release theatrically on Aug. 22 before it moves onto Apple TV+ on Sept. 5 — Washington plays a music mogul who’s told his son has been kidnapped, which leads to a series of complications rife with moral dilemmas. The film met with an enthusiastic reception, and Lee, as he took a bow, also noted, “And it is Malcolm X's 100th birthday today, so give it up for Malcolm!”
Washington couldn’t stick around for the fest’s official press conference today, and Lee, the morning after the premiere, appeared relatively mellow, avoiding any provocations. “My wife said, ‘Spike, be very careful what you say’,” he said with a smile, preferring to steer much of the conversation to his beloved New York Knicks and their playoffs with the Indiana Pacers. So, for example, he deflected an inevitable question about Trump’s movie tariff threat by saying, “I don’t know how that’s going to work.” Of efforts to bring movie-making back to the States, he said, “I don’t have the answer.”
Turning back to his own film — shot largely in Brooklyn, naturally — he noted Highest 2 Lowest isn’t the first time he’s owed a debt to Kurosawa. In fact, his iconic breakout, 1986’s She’s Gotta Have It, took its structure from Kurosawa’s Rashomon. Expressing his amazement that 18 years had gone by since he last worked with Washington, on 2006’s Inside Man, he said, “We didn’t lose a step.” He added of their collaboration, which now encompasses five films, “It’s been a blessing to have this body of work of us doing films that people love.”
Another star making a quick trip from New York to Cannes was Scarlett Johansson, who hosted Saturday Night Live this past weekend and then made it to the Croisette for Tuesday night’s unveiling of Eleanor the Great, her directorial debut playing in the Un Certain Regard section. She shared the spotlight with the movie’s 95-year-old star June Squibb — a Cannes vet, she previously attended with Alexander Payne’s 2013’s Nebraska — who stars in the film as a lonely woman who passes herself off as a Holocaust survivor. The two embraced as they basked in the applause, with Johansson telling the audience, “It’s a film that I feel is historic and also very timely now, and so I hope that you all carry it with you the way that I carry Eleanor with me.”
#TouchePasMaVF! Europe’s Dubious About Dubbing
While cinéastes have been focused on the auteur-driven films competing for the big prizes here at Cannes, in a commercial movie theatre off the Rue d’Antibes, XYZ Films was screening a sci-fi movie that could ultimately have more impact on the industry than whatever walks away with the Palme d’Or. The film in question was called Watch the Skies, an English-language version of a Swedish movie, UFO Sweden, that first appeared in the Cannes market two years ago. Directed by Victor Danell, the movie tells a Spielberg-ian tale of a teenage girl who’s convinced her father has been abducted by aliens. But what makes this new version of the film noteworthy is that it’s billing itself as “the world's first theatrical full-length feature to use AI for immersive dubbing.”
Now, when it comes to dubbing, AI is something of a dirty word in Europe, where films, if they’re to avoid subtitles, have to be dubbed into local languages. Earlier this year, a number of German actors who’ve built careers on dubbing released a viral video decrying “artificial voices from robots. These robots were trained with our voices, without our consent, illegally.” And more than 215,000 people have also signed an online petition titled #TouchePasMaVF. (Don’t touch my dubbing; VF is for “version française.)
But Scott Mann, co-CEO and founder of Flawless, which oversaw UFO Sweden’s makeover into the English-language Watch the Skies, would like everyone to relax, arguing that the company’s dubbing tool, TrueSync, doesn’t put jobs at risk.
As Mann explained it to me, no catalog of robotic voices was used, and so no actors were harmed in the making of the new version of the movie. Instead, the film’s dialogue was translated from Swedish into English, and then the original Swedish cast was called back to record the English words. Then TrueSync kicked in, matching the actors’ lip movements and expressions to that new dialogue. The goal is to avoid some of the problems that arise with traditional dubbing, where dialogue is often rewritten in favor of new words that better fit the visuals — and even then, the match-ups aren’t always very convincing.
“It’s a new form of dubbing really, that allows you to see the film as it’s meant to be seen,” said the L.A.-based Mann, who founded Flawless with tech entrepreneur Nick Lynes. “We do a true transcription of what the film was, and then the actors could perform it without worrying about the lip syncing, and then the visual output of the whole film is re-rendered, and that’s what you see.”
As for those actors who are worried about other approaches to AI dubbing, Mann says “they are absolutely right.” But he goes on to say, “Technology can be good or bad. There’s a right way of doing it, and a wrong way of doing it. If it's stealing rights, killing jobs, reducing artistic originality and artistic intentions, those things should be fought. And as AI increases its capacity, protections have to be hardened along the way.”
Claire’s Croisette: Rainy Days & Lauren Sànchez
It suddenly turned cold on Monday night and a deluge began. Coiffured ladies in high-heeled sandals got soaked, with the tails of their dresses dragging through the puddles. At the train station a beautiful young woman in a stunning gown was snapping selfies, seemingly unaware she was standing in front of garbage cans. Nothing here in Cannes dampens enthusiasm for self-glorification or the desire to hit the party circuit into the night. And for those who fancy their chances just talking their way into things, you will need a barcode, an accreditation email from the PR agency and your official festival badge to get past the gatekeepers. Even then, if you haven’t got the look, you might still get refused, one veteran French PR executive told me. He used to man such lines, he said, and got promoted because of his propensity for refusing people on a whim. Security here is tighter than a Hollywood face lift.
For those who failed at the ticket hustle for A-List dinners, they could listen to a group of international film festival executives engage in a DJ competition at Monday night’s “I Wanna Dance with the Nordics” soiree, run by the Nordic film industry and held at the Plage du Festival. Rotterdam won the turntable tussle, I’m told. Frank Underwood, aka Kevin Spacey — who has slowly begun to reclaim a place in Hollywood, though a much smaller one than he previously boasted, after he was found not guilty of sexual assault charges back in 2023 — was also spotted last night out on the town and is set to receive a Better World Fund award later today at the Carlton Hotel.
If you really wanted to test your mettle and stay on your feet until your dawn flight home took off, the party for French filmmaker Julia Ducournau’s Alpha, didn’t start until 1 a.m. earlier this morning. Ducournau won the Palme D’Or in 2021 for Titane. Before the party, someone at the screening of her latest, a horror movie, was removed by stretcher.
I heard Lauren Sànchez, the soon-to-be Mrs. Jeff Bezos, was spotted at the Chopard suite where celebrities get to select from baubles on offer. I’m told you have to get there early in the week so you’re not picking over the left-overs: quelle horreur! I also saw a big group of publicists huddled around a table poring over detailed documents looking very anxious. “Jeff is coming,” one of them said. But Bezos was enjoying his bachelor party in Madrid while his fiancé was honored with a humanitarian award at Monday night’s Global Gift Gala, hosted by Eva Longoria.
Photos and videos of Nicole Kidman have been popping up all over social media showing the Australian actress enjoying the good life on the Riviera; at the water’s edge in a giant white shirt and having a meal with Last of Us star Pedro Pascal, who’s at the fest with competition title Eddington. Kidman’s hairstylist however may be somewhere at the bottom of the sea this morning given the intense coverage of the star’s off-kilter weave that was noticed as she bent her head down for photographers ahead of the Kering Women in Motion dinner on Sunday. Sometimes the public gets to see how the magic happens.
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– Moving Away From #MeToo
It’s not often that the French and President Trump see eye to eye, but one legal eagle is thrilled with America’s bipartisan “Take it Down Act,” forcing tech platforms to remove revenge porn and fake AI-generated sexual deepfakes from the internet. French lawyer Philippe Coen spends his days working for the Walt Disney Company’s European outposts and his spare time running an NGO called Respect Zone, aimed at fighting hate online.
He’s been in meetings this week at the Mondrian Hotel here explaining how he’s talking to politicians and movie and sports people about his idea to protect reputations online. His aim is to encourage participants — from individuals to schools and businesses — to adopt an online badge stating that they adhere to principles of good behavior. Last year’s Cannes was dominated by discussions of #MeToo and rumors of a list of actors who were about to be exposed. The list never appeared. Coen told me, “If your name is being listed in an investigation about #MeToo, for instance, your career — with one reference to your name — can be completely spoiled. There is no reference to the presumption of innocence which doesn’t exist online. It’s like a trial with no jury.”
Kevin Spacey would likely have a thing or two to share on that.
News
Cannes Market Still Awaiting Big Deals
Business has been steady, but pricier items remain up for sale. → Click here to keep reading
French Industry Braces for Canal+ Cuts
The results could be 30-40 fewer films per year. → Click here to keep reading
Screen’s Global Production Awards Winners Unveiled
Focus and Universal’s Touch cited for Outstanding Use of Locations. → Click here to keep reading
Deals
Guillaume Canet to Star in Untitled Biopic for Pathe
He will play former French justice minister Robert Badinter in a film directed by Simon Jacquet. → Click here to keep reading
Ketchup Takes North American Rights to Misdirection
The thriller, directed by Kevin Lewis, stars Frank Grillo. → Click here to keep reading
Reviews
Spike Lee’s Highest 2 Lowest Is an “Ambitious Thriller”
The crime film marks Denzel Washington’s fifth collaboration with the director. → Click here to keep reading
Alpha Offers a Family Drama Set Against a Plague
It’s director Julia Ducournau’s follow-up to her Palme d’Or winning Titane. → Click here to keep reading
Exit 8 Is An “Ingenious” Video Game Adaptation
Genki Kawamura directed the chiller from the Cannes Midnight line-up. → Click here to keep reading
The Richest Woman in the World Offers Real-Life Drama
Isabelle Huppert’s character is inspired by L’Oreal heir Francoise Bettencourt. → Click here to keep reading
Features
Oliver Hermanus’ Five-Year History with The History of Sound
The film, starring Josh O’Connor and Paul Mescal, will debut in competition. → Click here to keep reading
Today’s Screen Jury at Cannes
The long-running Screen International Jury Grid is a critical ranking of competition films in Cannes, according to an assembled jury of 12 international film critics, including Screen’s reviewers (four stars is the top rating; an X means zero stars). Julia Ducournau, who won the Palme d’Or for 2021’s Titane, ties Eddington for the lowest average so far with her new film Alpha. → Click here for the full grid.
The Ankler x Screen International's Cannes Daily
Day 1: ‘Art Is a Threat’ as Oscar Race, the Resistance, Begin
Day 2: ‘Prices are Crazy’; Cruise ❤️
Day 3: KStew Debut; IMAX CEO on Nolan; Screen Jury Grid Starts!
Day 4: Eddington Divide; Fashion’s Film Dollars; $6K Tix Black Market
Day 5: RFK Jr. & the Dr.: Doc Seeks Buyer; Linklater’s Godard Pic Charms
Day 6: Wes' Circus; JLaw Pic's $24M Mubi Sale; Skarsgård's BDSM
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