Final 12 months presently, “Anora” performed like gangbusters on the Palais (viewers applause is a Cannes ritual that’s half efficiency and half actual, however tough to quantify), earned raves from the Display Worldwide jury grid, and inevitably, received the Palme d’Or. That gave Neon confidence to play its lengthy Oscar hand, efficiently, gaining 5 Oscar wins together with Greatest Image, Director, Enhancing, Actress, and Screenplay.
This 12 months the late-festival film that carried out as properly is Joachim Trier’s probably Norwegian Oscar entry “Sentimental Worth,” an intense household drama about a longtime actress (Renate Reinsve) with nervousness points whose estranged father (Sweden’s Stellan Skarsgård) seeks to regain his foothold within the movie trade with a brand new film starring his daughter. When she’s not , he casts an American actress (Elle Fanning) as a substitute. Each Reinsve and Skarsgård give towering performances that won’t be denied at Oscar time, provided that Neon, which purchased the movie a 12 months in the past at Cannes earlier than manufacturing, is adept at taking part in the awards recreation and lately added the Oscar whisperer Ryan Werner (Cinetic Media) to their in-house crew as distribution chief. This may very well be their sixth Palme d’Or win.
Apart from, two set items, together with Reinsve’s panic assault earlier than occurring stage opening night time, and a heartfelt second along with her sister (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas), are scene-stoppers. Motion pictures that draw on the feelings are sometimes winners, particularly with actors. 4 serve on this 12 months’s jury, together with the president Juliette Binoche, plus Halle Berry, Alba Rohrwacher, and Jeremy Robust.
Giving this movie an enormous leg up is that Trier is already established with Oscar voters; he performed the awards recreation with Neon’s “The Worst Individual within the World” (2021), which earned two Oscar nominations together with Unique Screenplay for Trier and Eskil Vogt, who reteam on “Sentimental Worth,” and Greatest Worldwide Characteristic. They’re members of the membership. And “Sentimental Worth” is a superb movie, not solely about household however about artwork, legacy, and reconciliation, as each the actress and her getting older director father wrestle to pursue their artwork.
Reinsve received Greatest Actress at Cannes in 2021 for Joachim Trier’s “The Worst Individual within the World” and has since added quite a few English-language tasks to her slate, from Apple TV+’s “Presumed Harmless” to Aaron Schimberg’s “A Totally different Man.” Her star is rising and he or she’s primed for main stateside awards play.
Simply as final 12 months Neon scooped up “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” on the final minute earlier than awards night time, simply in case “Anora” didn’t convey house the prize, this 12 months they’ve added to their battle chest Jafar Panahi’s “It Was Simply an Accident,” which additionally performed properly this week and will win a prize. The Iranian auteur returned to Cannes for the primary time since 2003; he conjured up the story in an Iranian jail. Neon additionally partnered with Panahi in 2021, releasing Cannes particular screening “The 12 months of the Eternal Storm.”
And never taking any probabilities, Neon simply acquired North American rights to Brazilian director Kleber Mendonça Filho’s 70s caper “The Secret Agent.” Star Wagner Moura has nabbed some Greatest Actor warmth at Cannes as a know-how skilled on the run hoping to reunite along with his son. The movie earned sturdy opinions for the Brazilian auteur behind “Bacarau.”
