Five days into the French film festival and a real winner has yet to emerge judging from reactions reports Variety. The latest entries from filmmaking veterans such as Ken Loach's "The Wind That Shakes the Barley", Pedro Almodovar's "Volver" and Nuri Bilge Ceylan's "Climates" have all drawn very good reaction, as has Scottish newcomer Andrea Arnold with "Red Road" and Emmanuel Bourdieu's black comedy "Poison Friends".
Drawing good response have been films like John Cameron Mitchell's super raunchy comedy "Shortbus", French anthology "Paris je t'aime", revenge drama "La tourneuse de pages", Rolf de Heer's Aboriginal epic "Ten Canoes", the post-tsunami Indonesian documentary "Serambi", Albert Serra's variation on the Don Quixote tale "Honor de Cavalleria", and the droll French comedy "Change of Address" from Emmanuel Mouret.
There's also been some real bombs, most notably "Donnie Darko" helmer Richard Kelly's follow up project "Southland Tales". Despite its all star cast (The Rock, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Seann William Scott), it apparently scored woeful reaction from the critics and exhibitors. Other high profile titles like Richard Linklater's "Fast Food Nation" and Lou Ye's "Summer Palace" have drawn very mixed responses.
Critical reaction may be all over the place, but business is certainly down from the sounds of it with Olivier Dahan's Edith Piaf biopic "La Vie En Rose" set to be the most hotly contended title.
