Cannes Film Festival's 77th Edition May Be About More Than Just Cinema This Year

The 77th Edition Of The Cannes Film Festival is struggling to keep the event purely about cinema this year. With the announcement of a worker's strike and the backdrop of the Israel-Palestine War, the Cannes Film Festival has had a lot of eyes on it for reasons other than news about cinema.

A group called the 'Sous les écrans la dèche' collective has been organising a strike for freelance filmmakers since last year, reported The Hollywood Reporter. Their name translates to 'Broke Behind the Screens'. They've been trying to fight against the implementation of the new French labour laws, which would make it significantly harder for the freelance film festival workers to gain the benefits of unemployment. This is because they're kept on a short-term contract.

The demands of the strike include a change in the contract that would allow workers to gain unemployment benefits, as well as changes to contracts from all the way back till 18 months ago so they can claim the benefits for their previous work. So far, according to Euronews, the only statement made on the topic was by the Director of the Film Festival, Thierry Frémaux, who said, "We are talking with them and working with them and hope that the negotiations will be successful".

The director also said that he would like to "have a festival without polemics." Unfortunately for him, there also seem to be rumours of a bunch of #MeToo allegations against people in the French film industry, which are apparently to be released on the day of the festival. While no such allegations have been released anytime soon, many sources reported that the festival had hired a crisis management team for such an event. The director made no comment regarding this.

As if to add gasoline to the fire, festival organisers will also need to keep a lookout for protests against the Israel-Palestine war if they want to "have a festival without polemics." Last year, a Ukrainian model, Ilona Chernobai, drenched herself in fake blood while wearing the colours of the Ukrainian flag as she walked down the red carpet of the Cannes Film Festival 76th Edition. She was quickly escorted out of the festival after the stunt, and this year, security is even tighter.

The city of Cannes banned all protests in and around the film festival, as reported by Variety. They've also doubled up on security and banned any pins in support of either Israel or Palestine, something they had allowed until just recently.

Despite all these measures, it is hard to say whether the 77th Edition of the Cannes Film Festival will actually go "without polemics."