Netflix remains welcome at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, said artistic director Thierry Fremaux, adding there has been constructive dialogue over the dispute involving films in competition
Speaking at the festival lineup press conference this morning in Paris, Fremaux said it was a “shame” not to have movies backed by the streaming giant at Cannes in some form but that there had been “constructive dialogue with Netflix, contrary to appearances,” and that Netflix remains “welcome in Cannes.”
“The Other Side of the Wind would have played out of competition, which didn’t pose a problem for the rules… Listen, we’ve had a good dialogue with Netflix in the past and I respect Ted Sarandos. And I want to tell him that if he accepted to screen the Welles film in Cannes, if we decided to celebrate such a major movie event together, then it would be a great thing for Netflix. They paid for the entire restoration of the film and they would be welcomed in Cannes as heroes,” Fremaux told The Hollywood Reporter. ” Netflix has its economic model, but Netflix also loves cinema, so why couldn’t they decide to bring a few films to Cannes each year — whether out of competition, or else in competition and then wait 36 months to release it on their platform? They have a lot of movies, and if Cannes decided to program one of them in competition, then why not just go for it?”
Referring to the scrubbed debut there ofThe Other Side of the Wind, Cannes executive Pierre Lescure said, “We regret it because it was a lovely gesture of cinema undertaken by Netflix and now they block it. It would have been a nice gesture but they didn’t want to do it. The debate is still open.”
While there had been reports that five Netflix films were slated to play at Cannes, Fremaux said Cannes had wanted just two Netflix movies this year, which were initially offered by Netflix: The Other Side of the Wind for an out of competition slot and another unnamed movie in competition, Roma by Alfonso Cuaron.
“I saw Alfonso Cuaron’s Romaseveral times and it’s a marvelous film and we wanted to have it in competition,” Fremaux told Variety. “As far as Orson Welles’ film The Other Side of the Wind, we were really eager to show the film out of competition. It’s a sad situation for everyone involved.”
On Wednesday, Netflix Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos said today the streaming giant will not send its films to the prestigious Cannes since its is barred from the competition because it doies not screen its movies theatrically there.Netflix was open to having its movies play theatrically in France, but a law in the country requires movies to not appear on video-on-demand platforms like Netflix for 36 months after their theatrical release.
Days before Netflix pulled The Other Side of the Wind from the Cannes Film Festival lineup, Welles’ youngest daughter, Beatrice, had made an emotional plea to the streaming giant to put aside its differences with the prestigious festival for the sake of her late father’s legacy..
“I saw how the big production companies destroyed his life, his work and in so doing a little bit of the man I loved so much. I would so hate to see Netflix be yet another of these companies…. The Other Side of the Wind belongs in Cannes, where they love and respect him more than anywhere else,” she wrote in an email to Sarandos.. “This was ‘his’ film festival. It is so appropriate that you should be there to take in the accolades for having done the work you did to make Wind a reality. What you have done is nothing short of cinematic history.”
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