Recently Vincent Lindon read the Wikipedia page and noted all the people who had served as chairman of the jury at the Cannes Film Festival. He scrolled past Steven Spielberg, Jane Campion, the Coen brothers, Cate Blanchett. And then, at the end of the list, he saw his own name as this year’s president.
Lindon opens his eyes wide in horror as he thinks about it. “They must be wrong!” he stood on it. “They made a mistake!”
Though Lindon is too modest to consider his place in such a legendary company, the 62-year-old actor is a huge star in France and recently gained international fame for “Titane,” in which he played a muscular fire captain who worked for a pregnant series. took care of killer. That daring film won the Palme d’Or at Cannes last summer, and now Lindon and his jury will be responsible for choosing the Palme’s next winner.
For Lindon, this is a very momentous matter. Over coffee last week, he spoke thoughtfully about how he plans to evaluate the 21 films in competition. Here are edited excerpts from our conversation.
You’ve been to Cannes before promoting your movies, but were you ever able to see other movies while you were here?
Not so much, because you have interviews, you are very nervous, anxious. I don’t like to stay too much. You come, you show the film and then you leave. That’s my way of working.
Do you still feel that nervousness when you present a film?
Oh, much more. You are carefree when you are younger. As you get older, you know the way of working better, but you are less carefree and more aware of what can happen. It’s like when you’re doing your first year in Grand Prix, you can’t imagine dying – you just drive fast. When it’s your seventh year, you know there are risks. You cannot understand because you are young. Wait, it will come.
How does that feeling of nervousness differ from the person helping pick the Palme d’Or winner?
It’s a very big responsibility. Maybe their life will change a lot. It’s not nothing – but I’m going to try to live in the present moment. In 15 days I don’t want to think about the past and say, “Why didn’t I take the time to do such and such?”
Even now, I’m proud and happy to be interviewing DailyExpertNews. When I was a young actor in drama school, if a friend of mine would have told me, “Vincent, you’re going to be the jury president at Cannes in 2022 and you’re going to give an interview to DailyExpertNews,” I would say to have said to him, “Yes, sure. Think about it, I’ll see the Pope?”
