Hail, Caesar! A Starry Night on the French Cinema Awards | EUROtoday

I’m on the sting of my plush crimson velvet chair, peering down at France’s cinema royalty. Some are nonetheless milling about, in no hurry to take their seats. Some of the nominees greet one another with broad smiles, masking their nervousness; others are whispering to their neighbors, testing the scene. The pleasure is palpable; the temper, ebullient. And no marvel. After a chaotic picture name and a glass of champagne (or two) grabbed off a tray earlier than the red-carpet strut inside Paris’s Olympia theater, the film-industry-packed viewers is now buzzing with expectation.

With my ringside seat up within the mezzanine, it is simple to identify among the main gamers: actor Jean Dujardin, sporting a graying beard, is chatting with actress Isabelle Huppert, whose outsized, thick-framed darkish sun shades conceal most of her face.

The 51st César Awards ceremony—the French equal of the Oscars—is about to start.

It’s all very glamorous, however Hollywood it’s not, neither is the vibe something just like the Cannes Film Festival. Sober stylish is crucial: a sea of ​​black with out fashionista frivolity. This shouldn’t be the place for flimsy robes with lengthy, trippable trains and breathy, teary-eyed acceptance speeches. Here, with 24 classes unfold throughout 110 nominated movies and a ceremony that lasts greater than three hours, you are extra prone to hear heartfelt proclamations concerning the present state of French cinema.

Meanwhile, all eyes are riveted on the entrance row, the place a grinning Jim Carrey—who will later obtain an honorary César award—is already the discuss of the city.

Then, lastly, it is showtime—the sparkly lights dim and actress Camille Cottin, Ceremony President (in a superbly reduce slinky black costume… and Macron-esque aviator glasses), steps onto the stage to kick off the night with a message: “French cinema is very much alive… and it is fragile. It’s salivating because it’s fragile. You have to make a lot of films in order for a few gems to emerge.” And sure, she tells us, France can also be the second-largest exporter of movies on the earth after the US. Oh sure?

But who desires to fact-check, now that Benjamin Lavernhe—a standout actor of the Comédie-Française and former César-nominated actor—takes the stage to the tune of thunderous applause. His energy-pumped performances are what everybody will later keep in mind: first, an elaborate dance quantity, clad in a dishevelled vibrant yellow swimsuit, a nod to Jim Carrey’s function in The Mask. Then, lickety-split, a fast change of costume and it is salsa time, surrounded by a squad of dancing New York–uniformed law enforcement officials who whoosh into the aisles, then swiftly disappear backstage.

The viewers is loving it.

As for the prize-giving—handing the winner a clunky four-kilo gilded bronze statuette that’s primarily summary artwork, a compressed block of metallic designed by the well-known sculptor César—this 12 months’s version flowed easily, with no provocative outbursts. (Who remembers when actress Corinne Masiero, the 2021 winner of the Best Costume award, stripped on stage through the reside broadcast to disclose messages written on her physique demanding extra authorities assist for the struggling cultural sector amid COVID-19 closures?)

Still, there have been a couple of critical appeals to acknowledge injustice.

Isabelle Adjani, whereas presenting the Best Actor award (which went to Laurent Lafitte for his function in The Richest Woman within the Worldimpressed by the story of French billionaire Liliane Bettencourt), requested all the boys within the room to face and applaud “in honor of women victims of sexual assault” who’ve suffered violence, explicitly together with Iranian ladies. Add to that Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani, who made an impassioned speech concerning the state of affairs again dwelling.

The most surprising second got here throughout a medley of clips proven in tribute to iconic Brigitte Bardot, when boos have been heard within the viewers—presumably due to her right-wing political stance.

Ironically, maybe, it was an American filmmaker, Richard Linklater, who received the Best Director award for his black-and-white movie New wavewhich recreates the making of Jean-Luc Godard’s New Wave 1960 basic Breathless. Call it a cinephile’s interval piece, in French, supposed to please an arthouse viewers. (Linklater didn’t attend the ceremony; nor did American director Paul Thomas Anderson, who was awarded the prize for Best International Feature for his Oscar-nominated One Battle After the Other.)

But nothing might prime the excessive level of the night, when Camille Cottin and French director Michel Gondry (finest identified for his 2004 quirky drama Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) invited Jim Carrey to simply accept his honorary award, adopted by a prolonged standing ovation. Close-ups of Carrey’s beaming youthful face even set off a wave of untamed hypothesis on the Internet about an impersonator—bah, garbage!

If the César Awards generally precipitate world distribution, then you’ll be able to look ahead to a whole roster of nice movies taking part in in your neighborhood theater, beginning with Carine Tardieu’s movie Attachment (The Ties That Bind Us), the most effective French movie of the 12 months, starring Valeria Bruni Tedeschi as a girl who develops an emotional bond with a younger father and his kids. Everyone can even be keeping track of the most effective feminine and male breakthrough prizes—non-professional newcomer Nadia Melliti for her function in The Little Sistera queer coming-of-age drama concerning the youngest sibling rising up in an Algerian household in a Paris suburb—and Canadian actor Théodore Pellerin in Ninoa few younger man who discovers he has a critical sickness.

It’s after midnight by the point all of the winners have given their thanks and are lastly herded onto the stage for one final picture. I stifle a yawn and attempt to ignore my rumbling abdomen as we stagger out of our seats and step into the night time. A shuttles awaits to take us to the Champs-Élysées—to the landmark brasserie Fouquet’s—for the subsequent spherical of celebration on the César Awards’ official sit-down dinner for 700 visitors.

Inside, the awards attendees swirl about, congratulating one another, whereas waiters stand poised like statues with trays of champagne. In the romantic haze of bubbles and heat, it feels just like the French cinema world is one large joyful household.

By the time we end the elegant three-course dinner—lobster and tangerine salad, veal pot-au-feu, and a vanilla-and-chestnut pastry—it is almost half previous three. But the room remains to be very a lot awake as one other César night time slowly fades to black.