Hello Smarty, it's Your Weekly Wag!

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Our team scoots off to Cannes.

Dear Wags,

My elder child—only a squirmy, dribbly little thing a moment ago—is about to graduate from college. That can’t be right. Yet somehow it is, and there is nothing to do but brace myself while things race past in a blur. There are people who leap into tomorrow with a knife clenched in their teeth, and those who mutter I’m not ready for this at every crossroads. You may find me malingering in Column B.

I feel shame about this, as if a healthier disposition toward the future will score me points. The future happens in any case! What you share with a darling child, or any loved one, is today. That’s Hallmark stuff we all know and kiss off. But it is terrible, sweet, and true. There will be days when it pierces your heart.

We are frequently told nothing motivates human beings like fear and rage. We forget the finer algorithms. Remember, and hold those you love close. You have time in this world together, and it’s never long enough. And now, here are this week’s diversions.

Yours Ever,

Mega-Movie: Coppola’s Megalopolis wills screen in competition (Cannes).

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Mega-Movie: Coppola’s Megalopolis wills screen in competition (Cannes).

Letter from Juan-les-Pins

Ah, Cannes! Here we are again, strolling down the Croisette, dodging mimes. We wonder how long this silliness can persist, given the growing sense that nothing — not even The Fall Guy!—can nudge movies back to the center of cultural discourse. All over town, there’s a gnawing fear that Chaos American Style has finally caught up to the French.

The French website Mediapart says it will publish “explosive” new #MeToo (must we still use the hashtag?) allegations during the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival, which kicked off yesterday. A gros scandale would be another headache for organizers already fending off a threatened event workers strike.

Thierry Frémaux, the fete’s irrepressible director, always dismisses anglophone gender and identity politics with a Gallic shrug. “We would like to have a festival without polemics,” he said earlier this week. “The politics should be up on the screen.”

Frémaux brushed aside protests when the festival screened a Johnny Depp movie last year. Now, he and Cannes president Iris Knobloch have hired a crisis PR agency in case something nasty hits in the next 12 days. Maybe news that Gérard Depardieu will stand trial over sexual assault allegations has them jittery.

In the meantime, we shall have a bevy of films on par with last year’s slate, which, produced The Zone of Interest, Anatomy of a Fall, May December, and Killers of the Flower Moon (which debuted out of competition). Here’s our abbreviated list of what to look out for. —Marcello Rubini and Sarah Brown

Megalopolis

Wag Supremo Francis Ford Coppola labored on his opus for 46 years and sunk a reported $100 million into the project. So, the stakes are high for him—and the whole idea of auteur-driven cinema. A fantastical metropolis is leveled by disaster, and an idealistic architect (Adam Driver) wants to build it back better. Corrupt forces led by the burg’s mayor (Giancarlo Esposito) will do anything to thwart him. The massive cast includes Nathalie Emmanuel, Shia LeBeouf, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Talia Shire and many other big names. — Marcello Rubini