Up on the rooftop of the Hôtel Martinez on the Cannes Croisette, Mike Faist is combating again tears. He misplaced his father in December and his grandfather simply three weeks later, and on Thursday, discovered himself deeply moved on the world premiere of Megalopolis, Francis Ford Coppola’s self-financed epic. This was Faist’s first day ever on the competition. “It could be [Coppola’s] last and my first—I don’t take it lightly, and I do not take my days for granted any more,” Faist tells me. “I’ve been having a little bit of a crisis for myself in the past couple of weeks, as Challengers has come out and I’ve been saying to people that, in the next, what, five or 10 years, we will probably be losing some of our greatest giants. And it really hurts. It’s very sad for me.” He will get choked up, and pauses to gather himself: “I get emotional thinking about it.”
The night earlier than, there was Faist in a tux, a reel of his best display screen work thus far—from the aforementioned Challengers to his placing work in Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story—enjoying to thunderous applause earlier than he accepted the night time’s ultimate Chopard Trophée, an official Cannes Film Festival 2024 honor bestowed to rising stars. It’s been a whirlwind of a weekend for the actor who’s simply skyrocketed to a brand new profile together with his red-hot tennis drama, costarring Zendaya and Josh O’Connor. He sees that film’s theatrical success and Cannes’s promise of cinematic artistry as of exactly the spirit he’d like to hold ahead on this business: “It’s an inhumane thing to just sit in your apartment alone by yourself and just mindlessly click on whatever’s next on the streaming thing,” he says. “We have to bring people together in those shared spaces.”
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Demi Moore shared the same sentimen simply moments earlier—notable, since she’s coming into Cannes not as a Chopard Trophée honoree, however as its esteemed Godmother, a prestigious designation reserved for display screen icons. Oh, and in addition because the host of the amfAR gala, a profit for HIV/AIDS analysis she beforehand hosted 27 years in the past (the final time she was in Cannes). Oh, and because the star of The Substance—a body-horror feast from director Coralie Fargeat that’s one of many buzziest remaining competitors titles. “It feels like the completing of a circle,” she says. (I additionally spoke with Moore for a career-spanning dialog on Sunday on the American Pavilion close by.)
The Chopard dinner is likely one of the glitziest, starriest occasions of a really glitzy, starry competition. In attendance on the Carlton Beach Club (sure, we walked on the sand in our tuxes and robes) alongside Moore, Faist, and fellow honoree Sophie Wilde have been Moore’s fellow Hollywood A-lister Kevin Costner, competitors jury members together with Greta Gerwig and Omar Sy, and arthouse favorites like Vicky Krieps. The occasion started with remarks by the competition’s basic delegate Thierry Frémaux and president Iris Knobloch, earlier than Moore took the stage for some remarks on Faist and Wilde’s behalf.
“This place represents not just the top of cinematic art, but a place where dreams come through frames and stories, and the location isn’t too shabby either,” Moore stated. “I argue you need nothing from me and have all the resources within yourselves to handle whatever comes your way. But as your appointed Godmother, remember, I’m not just here for the fun stuff, and you don’t have to do it alone.”
