Cannes Film Festival Selection 2021

 

The Cannes Film Festival makes its return this year for its 74th edition, from July 6th to 17th after the Covid-19 pandemic put a pause on the world's leading film festival for its 2020 edition.

An extensive list of past Palme d'Or winners and art house favorites are set to return to the seaside city of Cannes as organizers announced the official selections for the competition on Thursday.

Among the 24 directors whose films are heading to the Cote d'Azur is Sean Penn for his new film "Flag Day", Italy's Nanni Moretti with "Tri Piani" and France's Jacques Audiard with "Les Oympiades".

They will be joined by three big influential directors that had already been announced: Wes Anderson for "The French Dispatch", Paul Verhoeven for "Benedetta" and Leos Carax for "Annette".

"Annette" is the first film in a decade from French arthouse darling Carax and his first in English. It stars Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard as a celebrity couple awaiting a mysterious child.

Dutch filmmaker Verhoeven – who has often married art and salaciousness with movies like "Basic Instinct", "Showgirls" and "Elle" – is being recognized for his latest offering "Benedetta", about a lesbian nun in a 17th-century Italian convent.

Normally the Cannes Film Festival takes place in the month of May but this year the festival was postponed until early July. France will have lifted the evening Covid-19 curfew by then, although travelers from specific locations may still face quarantine measures, including those from Britain although things appear to be on the positive side.

Festival director Thierry Frémaux stated there will be the usual parties and dinners as well as events to give holidaymakers on the Cote d’Azur a chance to enjoy the event, such as screenings on the beach.

Covid-19 precautions will still be in force, however. “We won’t be kissing at the top of the [red carpet] steps,” Frémaux said.

Oscar-winner Jodie Foster, who first walked the red carpet at Cannes as a 13-year-old when she starred in “Taxi Driver”, will be presented with an honorary Palme d’Or.

One silver lining from the disruption of the past year has been a backlog of cinematic gold that gave organizers some 2,000 films to wade through as they made their selection for the 74th edition.

Another past Palme d'Or winner returning to the Croisette is Thailand's Apichatpong Weerasethakul with his first English-language film "Memoria", starring Tilda Swinton.

Iran's two-time Oscar-winner Asghar Farhadi will also return with "A Hero" while Russia's renowned director Kirill Serebrennikov – who has lately faced significant pressure from authorities – will be in competition with "Petrov's Flu". 

Here are the 24 films competing for the prestigious Palme d'Or prize, to be awarded by a jury headed by US director Spike Lee.

- "Annette" by Leos Carax, France

- "The French Dispatch" by Wes Anderson, US

- "Benedetta" by Paul Verhoeven, Netherlands

- "A Hero" by Asghar Farhadi, Iran

- "Tout s'est Bien Passé" (Everything Went Well) by Francois Ozon, France

- "Tre Piani" (Three Floors) by Nanni Moretti, Italy

- "Titane" (Titan) by Julia Ducournau, France

- "Red Rocket" by Sean Baker, US

- "Petrov's Flu" by Kirill Serebrennikov, Russia

- "Par un Demi-Clair Matin" (now known by the title "France") by Bruno Dumont, France

- "Nitram" by Justin Kurzel, Australia

- "Memoria" by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand

- "Lingui" by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, Chad

- "Les Olympiades" (Paris' 13th District) by Jacques Audiard, France

- "Les Intranquilles" (The Restless Ones) by Joachim Lafosse, Belgium

- "La Fracture" by Catherine Corsini, France

- "The Worst Person in the World" by Joachim Trier, Norway

- "Compartment No 6" by Juho Kuosmanen, Finland

- "Casablanca Beats" by Nabil Ayouch, France-Morocco

- "Ahed's Knee" by Nadav Lapid, Israel

- "Drive My Car" by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, Japan

- "Bergman Island" by Mia Hansen-Love, France

- "The Story of My Wife" by Ildiko Enyedi, Hungary

- "Flag Day" by Sean Penn, US

June 2021 Coronavirus Update

 

Well, it’s looking like things are finally getting back to some sense of normalcy, almost.

As of May 19, 2021, the curfew in France was moved from 6 pm to 9 pm with restaurants and cafes being allowed to open their terraces at 50% capacity.

As of this evening, June 8, 2021, the curfew gets moved from 9 pm to 11 pm, although those out between 11 pm and 6 am will still need an attestation filled out citing an essential reason for being outside.

More welcoming changes include the reopening of indoor seating in restaurants and cafés. Customers will now be welcomed back inside, albeit with a 50% percent limit on capacity and a six-person maximum per table. Customers must, however, provide contact details in order to take advantage of indoor seating, with many cafés offering a scannable QR option to make the process simple.

Rules on terraces will also change, allowing establishments with outdoor space to operate at full capacity, though the six-person per table restriction will still be in effect.

There will also be the introduction of the travel ‘traffic light’ system that also goes into effect on June 9th. This program entails a green, orange and red list of countries who are allowed into France under differing criteria based on the current health situations in their nations.

Also, to begin with, are the health passports. Already operational via the TousAntiCovid app, users can scan vaccination certificates or recent negative Covid tests from the My Wallet section. From June 9th, this will be an entry requirement for certain large events, such as concerts and sports matches.

With the advent of the health passport, events of up to 5,000 will also be allowed once more, subject to rules regarding social distancing and the usual protections.

Tourist sites, cinemas, shops, and museums will also be able to welcome the public back with an increased capacity. Theatres and cinemas can have up to 65% normal capacity, with a maximum of 1,000 patrons, or 5,000 with a health passport.

Guests at weddings and civil ceremonies are limited to 50% venue capacity and funerals can have up to 75 attendees. Currently, nightclubs will remain closed but there is talk of them opening possibly around July 1st, so fingers crossed there.

Also, some gay saunas are slowly up again in places like Marseille but I'll keep you updated on other locations as time moves on.

Gatherings of more than 10 people in public spaces are still discouraged, and masks are still mandatory in public indoor spaces, with a risk of a €135 fine for non-compliance. Check your local listings on rules as most cities are also still requiring masks in outdoor public spaces as well.

Summer Reading

In the middle of March 2021, announcements continued to be made practically every week in regards to what restrictions were about to be added or staying the same for us in France due to the Coronavirus situation.

This meant, our curfews were still going to stay in place and most of the shops were going to be closed again for an extended time period along with the radius of which we were allowed to travel being that of 10km. Basically, the government wanted everyone to stop movement as much as possible to protect against the spread of the virus while vaccinations have increased.

Fortunately, my work has kept me busy taking care of clients’ requests from around the world, if not for now, then in the near future once borders start opening up again.

Although I work a minimum of 12 hours a day, pretty much every day of the year, I still felt like I had some time to take on another project, and what better time than during a pandemic? This project has been in the back of my mind though for years and encouraged by others to pursue it, so that is what I have done.

I’ve written a book.

Bathhouse Babylon has been released this weekend as an e-book and paperback and tells a true, in-depth account of part of my former work and life in North America.

At that time, I managed three gay bathhouses, or gay saunas, as they are called here in Europe, over an extensive number of years. I wanted to tell a story that is more of an insider’s scoop on the inner workings of the bathhouse industry, kind of like a behind-the-scenes adventure.

During various times in that field of work, I kept diaries as a way to navigate what might have been taking place, no matter the emotion (and there were plenty), and as it was happening. I had a gut feeling it would at some point be useful for myself in the future, most of all to see how I have grown as an individual.

When you work in bathhouses, the bullshit is stripped away, quite literally at times. There is a whole social dynamic about it all that much of the outside world might not have privy to and is absolutely fascinating to observe and be surrounded by at all times.

You see how men manoeuver in that environment on a daily basis, for the most part simply because of their unending sexual desires which in turn both motivates or can dictate how men think on occasion, whether it is to their benefit or not.

You can’t have a bathhouse without sex so of course, there are extraordinary sex stories in the book but there is far more to what encompasses bathhouses than all of that and this is what I also wanted to write about, to give people background information based on my experiences.

I wasn’t sure how I would feel working on my first book, but it’s been one of the most enjoyable projects in my life and seemed to flow naturally, which is easy to do when you’re telling the truth.

It’s brought back every emotion of that time, both good and bad and it’s felt extremely cathartic in many ways. It’s given me the gift of being able to see how I was then, to how I have grown now, and to be able to realize how much of it has actually helped prepare me for my life in France and my work in the luxury real estate world.

It’s given me the education on how to observe everything at all times, negotiate better, navigate scenarios through strategic thinking, know when to speak up, know when to have decorum, and best of all, how to deal with bullshitters.

Overall, I feel that the more those of us in the LGBTQ community can contribute to our history, no matter our experiences have been, it is all a part of our story and I believe it will be beneficial for those who will come after us to learn from it all to know how to best move forward in life.

Unintentionally, as life does come at you full force, there will be things in this book that will shock people but also make them laugh, sad, infuriated, happy, and hopefully learn from to see other aspects of the world.

Please find Bathhouse Babylon on Amazon and several other online retailers to come.

Enjoy!

French Riviera Summer Nude Beach Update

Summer feels like it is practically here already in the French Riviera and for those not already hitting the nude beaches, I thought I’d provide a little bit of an update now that Coronavirus restrictions are slowly being lifted.

Locally, between Nice and Monaco, the most popular gay nude beach near Monaco is situated close to the family oriented, Plage de St Laurent à Eze.

https://www.gayfrenchriviera.com/2011/10/stlaurent-eze-gay-nude-beach.html

Seen by many as the obvious natural choice due to its discreet location and the best known in the area meaning men from all backgrounds, shapes and sizes will be in attendance on a daily basis. 

Having just visited this beach in early April, I was surprised how many men were there taking in the Springtime sunshine while also going for a dip in the sea. 

There are two ways to get to this beach, but please, for your safety use the directions listed in my post link above. There is another way to reach the beach near Cap Estel but it is not on a very safe path and will take you just as long to get to the beach if not longer.

Men of every nationality go to this beach and everyone is welcome. My advice, you can sun yourself on any of the large rock areas jutting out at the sea but if you want to relax on the actual beach, get there early to get your spot, no matter the day of the week, obviously weekends are busier.

Wear athletic shoes to get there for ease over the rocks on the trail and bring lots of fluids and a snack as there are no concession stands set up for obvious reasons.

Next up, the nude beaches of Saint Jean Cap Ferrat.

The most popular one of these being Plage du Phare, at the sea under the white villa by the lighthouse.

https://www.gayfrenchriviera.com/2011/12/saint-jean-cap-ferrat-gay-nude-areas.html

Very easy to get to but there have been some changes over this past winter season.

When you get to the lighthouse, head towards Villefranche-sur-Mer but almost immediately under the lighthouse you will see a small white, slightly hidden villa to your left and below it is the beach.

You used to be able to follow the fence line protecting the villa and jump a step down and into the villa owner’s stairs towards the beach. This year though he has recently updated his garden and with that has erected a new fence barrier so that people cannot get on to his stairs to the sea as easily.

It might get removed over the next few summer months and so if it has, I will update this post, otherwise, make your way along the usual hiking trail a bit further north away from the owner’s fence line and you will see a couple of stairs leading to some greenery where you will see a slight trail (that should get more worn through this summer) that will take you down to the beach.

This beach is the most popular location for nude sunbathing and although those from above near the lighthouse will be able to see you, unless they have binoculars, they won’t see much.

Since this beach is also below Villa Santo Sospir, while enjoying the sunshine and dips in the sea, keep in mind back in the day this was also a popular spot for the artist Jean Cocteau and his lover Jean Marais and their gang.

Again, further north towards Villefranche-sur-Mer, from the hiking trail you will come across the also unmarked Rochers Crau Nao, Crique Crau Nao and Plage de la Cuisse.

These beaches though are more so rocky enclaves and to be honest, I have hiked this trail for many years and have only encountered one or two nudists sunbathing. They are known but not really used by those looking to suntan nude and it’s not recommended to swim in all those locations due to the rough waters and rocks.

Plage du Phare is your best bet. There seems to always be room for lots of people yet it doesn’t get too crowded and is mainly known only in the local gay community.

Bring your sunscreen, water and enjoy your summer!