Sales, Godard and Wes Anderson, oh my! Sunday at Cannes was packed with action, from the premiere of a new Wes Anderson movie (and star-studded red carpet to go along with it, natch) to the first major sale of the festival. Let’s get going.
Wes Anderson’s latest
Wes Anderson brought the cast of his new film “The Phoenician Scheme” to France, and while the ensemble only featured a few newcomers – namely Mia Threapleton (Kate Winslet’s daughter) and Michael Cera – most critics agreed that the idiosyncratic filmmaker has brought something fresh to the table: a tale about capitalism. Benicio del Toro stars as the wealthiest man in Europe who tries to get his soon-to-be-nun daughter in on his latest scheme, hence the title.
In his review for TheWrap, William Bibbiani made note that while the film is very much in keeping with Anderson’s established aesthetic and style, “The Phoenician Scheme” is “a huge departure.”
“He hasn’t gone out of his way to tackle capitalism before, even though many of his films feature posh bourgeois protagonists who can afford to be so peculiar,” our critic noted. “The themes of enlightenment and materialism are frequently set at odds with one another, as though they are mutually exclusive, but Anderson’s ‘Scheme’ finds the two meeting in the middle and making a tidy, loving little life together. In a way it’s his most challenging work, even though it is — as his films often are — breezy and friendly.”
It’s a warmer reception than the one that greeted Anderson’s pandemic-themed “Asteroid City” back in 2023, but we’ll go to bat for that one as an underrated title in his esteemed filmography.
And during Monday’s press conference for the film, Anderson was feeling spicy, mocking Trump’s proposed tariffs on films made outside the U.S.
“The tariff is fascinating,” Anderson said when asked about the issue. “I’ve never heard of a 100% tariff. I feel that he’s saying he’s going to take all the money, and then what do we get?” He grinned and shrugged. “It’s complicated to me. Can you hold up the movie in customs? I want to know the details first. And I’ll hold off on my official answer.”
Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson attend the “Die My Love” red carpet (Photo by Stephane Cardinale – Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images)
Mubi takes “Die, My Love”
The first big sale of the festival happened on Sunday, with Mubi – the burgeoning distributor behind last year’s Oscar-winning body horror “The Substance” – spending more than $20 million to acquire Lynne Ramsay’s domestic drama “Die, My Love.” The film stars Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson as a couple whose marriage begins to unravel after the birth of their child, and while reviews were mixed-positive, the starpower of Lawrence and Pattinson alone guaranteed this one was going to find a home.
Lawrence opened up about making the film as a first-time mother herself at a Sunday press conference, and how her personal life bled into the character.
“As a mother, it was really hard to separate what I would do as opposed to what she would do. And it was just heartbreaking,” Lawrence said of making the film. “I had just had my firstborn, and there’s not really anything like postpartum. It’s extremely isolating, which is so interesting. When Lynne moves this couple into Montana, she doesn’t have a community. She doesn’t have her people. But the truth is, extreme anxiety and extreme depression is isolating, no matter where you are. You feel like an alien.”
It’s a big move for Mubi, which grabbed “The Substance” when the completed film was dropped by Universal Pictures. It went on to score Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Director and Actress for its star Demi Moore. Could Lawrence, an Academy darling, be set for a similar fate?
Linklater unbothered by Trump’s “dumb” tariffs
Donald Trump’s proposed tariff on films made outside the U.S. has been a topic of discussion at the Cannes Film Festival so far, and American filmmaker Richard Linklater made a brief aside about the threat on Sunday.
“The tariff thing, that’s not going to happen, right?” Linklater said during the press conference for his Jean-Luc Godard tribute “Nouvella Vague.” “That guy changes his mind like 50 times in one day. It’s the one export industry of the U.S., it would be kind of dumb to… Whatever, we don’t have to talk about that.”
The “Boyhoood” filmmaker also suggested that all directors should try and make a movie about making movies, as he did with “Nouvelle Vague,” which charts the making of Godard’s classic French New Wave film “Breathless.”
“If you do it long enough, you should make a film about making films,” Linklater said. “It felt like an important moment in cinema history, so it was fun to dial down on one film and learn so much about it.”
Alexander Skarsgard and Harry Melling at Cannes 2025 (Getty Images)
Alexander Skarsgard and Henry Melling get kinky
The film “Pillion” first made waves when it was announced for its buzzy premise – Alexander Skarsgard plays the leader of a biker club who takes on a “weedy wallflower” played by “Harry Potter” actor Henry Melling as his submissive. And judging by the first reactions to the film’s premiere at Cannes on Sunday, it didn’t disappoint.
“Probably the 2nd, 3rd critic to reference Pillion as the gay Babygirl, but it has significantly more to say about the human condition,” ThePlaylist’s Gregory Ellwood said.
“The intimacy coordinator on this must have been paid overtime,” one Letterboxd user wrote.
Reviews
Speaking of “Babygirl,” TheWrap’s critic Chase Hutchinson raved about Harris Dickinson’s directorial debut, “Urchin.” The film stars Frank Dillane as a recovering addict, and Hutchinson compared the film positively to Danny Boyle’s “Trainspotting” and the Paul Mescal-fronted “Aftersun.”
Hutchinson wrote: “Just as these are high points of praise, Dickinson also does much that he can call his own. It cements the film as a breathtaking work of overwhelming humanity and a debut for the ages.” High praise indeed.
As for the Wagner Moura film “The Secret Agent,” a ‘70s romp that also features a rampaging severed leg, TheWrap’s Steve Pond acknowledged the film’s messiness is part of its charm. An excerpt from his review:
“Does it all hold together? Nope. “The Secret Agent” is all over the place – not literally, since like almost all of Filho’s films, it takes place in the Brazilian city of Recife, his hometown – and cohesiveness or coherence are not high on its list of attributes. But its messiness is part of its charm and part of the point; a film that took itself more seriously than this one wouldn’t let a climactic gun battle turn into an almost cartoonish grand guignol splatter-fest.”
The post Cannes Day 6: Wes Anderson’s Scheme appeared first on TheWrap.
