"Holy Motors," America! Trippy Cannes Standout Crosses the Atlantic

Back in May, this year's selection of Cannes competition titles were consecutively unveiled to the international press, inviting obligatory reactions of either a) rapturous praise, b) outbursts of critical fury over the latest mess from a declining auteur, or c) withering indifference from audiences, critics, and potential distributors. In lockstep with the prestige of a world premiere in competition at Cannes, so too did the sales teams of each picture on the Cannes roster and literally hundreds other titles - many of them not even in production yet, banking on enough international pre-sales coming together chez Marché du Film before the week winds down. (These pre-production distribution deals have become all but essential in financing most of the films coming out of Europe during any given year, and a sizable portion of financing for a growing number of Hollywood productions for that matter.)


It goes without saying that pictures products up for grabs in Cannes will inevitably skew higher-brow than the collective of independently - and often just partially - financed Hollywood productions that grace the American Film Market each year. Much of what's for sale actually sells, because it's low-budget, low-risk crap, including a legion of brazen knockoffs of popular theatrical releases of the moment designed to dupe dumb consumers who will never make a fuss or even realize the difference. With just-off titles ("U.S.S. Battleship" hit Redbox right on cue with the summer blockbuster release of "Battleship," for instance, with cover art duplicating the Universal movie's poster right down to the font choice. This trash is not exclusive to stateside sales, to be fair, but American entertainment certainly sets the bar as low as possible by churning out shamelessly derivative shit with very low overhead, eventually turning a modest profit, one dollar at a time, following prestigious gala premieres in red McDonalds kiosks nationwide.

Now, I am only burying the lede here to make a point, which is that Americans are afraid of high art, especially in the form of movies, and audiences here just cannot be depended upon to show up for weird foreign shit that lacks the markers of what we've come to identify as Quality Movie Entertainment: a happy ending, straightforward narrative and on-the-nose dialogue that explains every last detail of what's happening and leaves no room for abstract interpretation.

And if that enigmatic dialogue happens to be subtitled, forget it! If weird people are behaving outside the confines of how normal characters are supposed to conduct themselves in a movie, OMG, refund! I don't understand the general tendency for audiences to be annoyed by the expectation of thought --  requirement for any experience to become authentic -- when watching movies. "Unless it's got robots & is based on a kids toy/cartoon franchise, why even bother? If I want to think, I'll stay home and read."
Intellectual substance and challenging ideas are least among the priorities of our moviegoing public, which is probably the main reason why Cannes and its Marché du Film have remained such a stalwart of cultural significance far beyond continental borders. Without European cinema shouldering the burden to keep cinema alive and relevant as Art and not merely Entertainment, I fear that by now, American independent film would have hit a ceiling somewhere near the benchmark of crowd-pleasing quirkiness set by the likes of "Juno," never to ascend above the realm of ironic outfits worn by hyper-articulate Manic Pixie Dream Girls.

The man in that movie is acting like a crazy person! We want our money back!

In any case, turning a profit has never been an expectation for European art house fare exported stateside for urban theatrical runs, so not much rests on the box office numbers for Lars Von Trier's latest picture once it finally makes its way to the States.  It's kinda nice that nobody expects something like "Antichrist" or, more to the point, "Holy Motors," to hit big with even the most adventurous of urban cinephiles, so there's a refreshing absence of commercial pressure for Euro imports to fire on any cylinders other than creative.

The micro-indie distributors that handle most of these pictures stateside acquire rights for a fraction of the millions that, say, Fox Searchlight plunked down for "Black Swan," acting as the curators of cinema in America with their dedication to bringing challenging films from greatly revered international auteurs to the small but distinctive stateside market. We, as lovers of film, should probably send these people a thank you note, holiday cards every year, something!

So, it is with great thanks that to upstart boutique distributor Indomina Media (which also brought summer's best doc "The Imposter" to art houses this year) that I'm able to anticipate the U.S. release of polarizing Cannes competition title "Holy Motors," which will play for two weeks on a pair of New York screens before expanding slowly nationwide in November & December.

I wrote about "Holy Motors" over the summer, thrilled at the word out of Cannes that nutso French director Léos Carax had birthed a truly cinematic rarity, inciting swooning praise and disgruntled dismissals in equal measure. When a film's first public impression is one incites reactionary love/hate extremes and little else between, I tend to rush the movie to the top of my Must-See list because either way, strong reactions to a cinematic experience are what seeing movies is all about.

"Holy Motors" is pitched something like "Cosmopolis" meets "Mulholland Dr." in Paris, a bizarro journey into night that follows Monsieur Oscar -- one of the most mischievously original screen protagonists in memory -- as he rides around Paris in a limousine, changing into multiple characters for a series of mysterious "appointments."

Apparently there is a crazy-awesome musical number featuring Kylie Minogue, and Eva Mendes plays the model Kay M. (a part originally conceived for Kate Moss), a spin on Beauty to Monsieur Oscar's Beast, sharing a shadowy darkest-of-night encounter that exemplifies Carax's intention to blend film noir with romance, melodrama with mystery, intrigue with irony, going over the top with reckless abandon to give audiences a deliriously unique entertainment. Our faces will look a little something like this:

I can't wait to take the all-night limo ride with Monsieur Oscar through the City of Lights, to experience something new and totally one-of-a-kind, happy endings be damned. Trip on the trailer below and tell me you're not spellbound. "Holy Motors" opens in New York City on October 17, and at Fox Tower in Portland Nov. 30; check out the release schedule/theaters list for more info about the "Holy" rollout.