Cinema @ CANNES v/s Glamour @ CANNES

This year, the 66^th Cannes International Film Festival was held from the 16^th-25^th of May and the run up to the festival called in the media to write about it celebrating 100 years of Indian cinema. While Nandita Das and Vidya Balan were on the jury this time, Amitabh Bachchan, Karan Johar, Sonam Kapoor, Zoya Akhtar and many popular faces of Bollywood became representatives of our country like every other year. There was nothing new in that. In fact, in the recent years the Cannes film festival has come to be associated more with glitz, glamour and showbiz rather than with what it started off as---- a show of sheer cinematic beauty from all over the world.

Gone are the days when Mrinal Sen’s  Khandahar, Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali (The Song of the Road) and Ritwik Ghatak’s Titash Ekti Nadir Naam ( A River named Titash) and other Indian films would be the show stealer  at Cannes year upon year. They made our country proud by winning the Palme D’Or on many occasions.  The Indian media has sadly shifted its focus from the movies to the glamorous world of who’s wearing what at the red carpet. The actors and actresses featuring in the movies are the show stealers today, and often the independent cinema that should have been the actual focus, takes a backseat. So today, we would all know what Sonam Kapoor wore at Cannes because she is on the front page of the entertainment supplement of every newspaper and fashion magazine; we would know why Sabyasachi Mukherjee designed something ‘unique’ and ‘truly Indian’ for Vidya Balan, but not many of us would know what ‘Monsoon Shootout’, a film by Amit Kumar, which was screened in the Midnight Projection section of the festival is all about. What an absolute contrast this is from the Cannes of the 50s, 60s and 70s!

The Indian media made a big deal about the screening of Bombay Talkies at Cannes as a tribute to the 100 years of Indian cinema but cared too less to write about the low key, simple and touching tale that was the focus of Ritesh Batra’s The Lunch Box which received a standing ovation after its screening. It is the sheer choice to report only the glamorous side of such an esteemed film festival that has left cine enthusiasts in India stunned and bewildered. Is it just the media’s bias or a conscious effort to make fashion the USP of Cannes? 

The media’s coverage of the festival has highly been one sided and even entertainment channels have not bothered to go beyond fulfilling the audience’s demands. It has been showbiz and entertainment all the way- entertainment for the predominantly Bollywood movie watching audience.  We saw the trend setters, the trend breakers and we saw who walked hand-in-hand with whom on the red carpet. Sadly, we didn’t get to see or read much about the absolutely brilliant films that were screened for 12 days at the festival. It makes me wonder if we would,  as consumers of various forms of media be able to wisely differentiate between the Cannes film festival, the Berlin International film festival, and the IIFA Awards in India any more.

  

The media can surely do better. Thus, it is a pity to see that serious Indian cinema at Cannes is dying a slow death in the hands of the media and making way for undeserving and unnecessary glamour.