Experiential Paper Second and Final Draft: Cannes: A Bubble of the World’s Class Dynamics at Play

On the last day of the festival, I wore this white Ralph Lauren sundress with blue flowers. There was this moment as Caroline and I walked from the train station to the festival grounds where I looked down at the pretty, flowy skirt of my dress and I watched as it drifted past the blank face of a woman crouched on the street. Like all of us here, I have walked by countless homeless people in my life. I have avoided eye contact and repeated the empty phrase, “Sorry I don’t have any cash on me,” whether that be true or not, more times than I’m proud to admit. So, what really made this memory stick, what made me feel something for this woman when I’ve shut out so many others, was how dark her skin was, caked in layers of dirt and grime, and the fact that she wasn’t even begging anymore, instead just simply staring ahead, arms cradling her own body. I couldn’t shake off this so clear visual juxtaposition for many blocks, until I finally did and the main concern on my mind became: are we going to make it to Wild Goose Lake in time because I also want to grab some coffee at the AmPav before.

At first, I was going to write this very scathing takedown of the elitism at this festival, but I felt like this was inherently hypocritical of me to do as I am also participating in and actively benefiting from this system. I still handed out my business card to any person who seemed willing to take it as I strutted around the AmPav in my blazer, lavender latte in hand. I still posed to take pictures in my prom dress in front of the sleek yachts in the marina, which are basically physical manifestations of the phrase “sucks to suck” to any other person in the same desolate circumstances of that woman mentioned in the first paragraph. Because of this fear of being hypocritical or having already exposed too much of myself to this class, my first draft of this paper shied away from any larger commentary on my experience here in lieu of a list of lighthearted anecdotes. While this would’ve worked, it didn’t feel right and I knew I had a unique perspective to offer to this conversation on ‘class warfare’ as Eric Kohn described it. After all, that Ralph Lauren dress I was wearing I bought secondhand for $7.00 and the way I was able to be on that street corner with that lady at that exact moment was through the scholarships I received to come here.

To start off, my very first day at the festival, I was escorted out of The Majestic because of my beggar’s sign for the Dead Don’t Die after using the bathroom (luckily I stole a roll of toilet paper from them so it was still worth it). I rushed getting ready that day, my hair was greasy, my make-up was minimal, and I had already been feeling self-conscious, but this really pushed me over the edge. At Cannes, there really just is this overwhelming pressure of having to be able to sell yourself at any given moment. Everything is about first impressions or “your brand” as one of the producers who gave us advice would call it, until your very identity must be able to be pitched in under 90 seconds.

This bleak commodification extended to the films we saw as well. While I welcomed and championed films that critiqued class dynamics like Parasite and Atlantics and Bull, I couldn’t stomach some of the out of touch language used in film reviews where Parasite got simplified to a “creepy invasion of the lifestyle snatchers” as if the division between the Parks and Ki-taek’s family simply is a matter of “lifestyle”. I felt this same sensation looking around at the sea of nice clothes and designer handbags in these theaters, where accessories were worth even more than the $3,000 that seemed simply impossible for the imprisoned mother in Bull to even fathom. I couldn’t shake the sense that the telling of all of these necessary stories of the voiceless and underprivileged at this festival were essentially becoming a fetishization of the poor experience. The wealthy and famous elite of the world could shed a tear and say how moved they were by these heartbreaking films and then afterwards sleep well, safe in their soft beds at The Majestic, while the people whose lives are the very substance for this emotional catharsis may not ever find such a nice place to rest.

However, I did find refuge in some of the amazing people I met here: producers and directors and festival programmers I met at the emerging LGBT filmmakers showcase, female filmmakers like Rima Das and Annie Silverstein I got to talk to, other students from the AmPav, and the fellow incredible students on this trip. This felt like being thrown into the deep end of capitalism’s death grip on the film industry, and I needed it. My biggest takeaway from the festival is a reaffirmed faith in myself to become a storyteller and filmmaker based on my own merit and not on how well I can commodify me.