Regret to inform that my second day at Cannes was not an especially satisfactory one: three films that all fell short in one way or another and my first shutout (owing to my dingy yellow-card status) from a Competition screening – despite queuing 45 minutes in advance. (That’d be Korean genre piece “The Housemaid,” by the way, which doesn’t appear to have set the Croisette alight, to go from colleagues’ reactions.)
Two upsides exist to this turn of events. First, I’m managing to catch up on plenty of reading while in the screening queue, so can confidently inform you that the latest Kazuo Ishiguro volume is a thorough disappointment, even if I can tell you nothing of “The Housemaid.” Second, it freed up time for a commiserating drinks session with Sasha Stone and Jeffrey Wells, winding up on the beach at an open-air screening of “From Here to Eternity.” At festivals, there’s always a plan B.