Cannes in a Van Film Festival 2013: blog 6

Blog 6

With the weather being in our favour for the past couple of days, Ross and I (Oliver) decided to make the trip into Cannes to see what the city looks like by day. Our base of operations is in a little campsite in the woods of Mandelieu-la-Napoule a few miles out from the centre of Cannes, and as two young and somewhat athletic chaps we decided to make the journey by foot. Despite the walk taking longer then anticipated the beaches looked ever so inviting. Unfortunately we didn’t have the time stop and make sand castles so we pushed on into Cannes and into the manic streets.

The roads around the Palais de Festival were closed to traffic so us mere mortals could get close only to grab some generic touristy-style snaps of the red carpet. We could only begin to imagine how much better it would have looked as Ryan Gosling hovered over like some sort of deity. It really did make us wonder what it was that people came to Cannes for; is it to get a chance to see the latest movies from some of the worlds most interesting filmmakers? Or is it really because everyone follows celebrities like lost puppies?

In any case Ross and I didn’t feel comfortable falling into the latter category so went looking for the other side of Cannes – the side that people ignore when passing in the street. Now this might sound odd, but we felt that sifting through their trash outside the Carlton Hotel was one of the purest ways of getting closer to the celebrity lifestyle.  Strangely enough all the bins outside the top hotels were locked prompting us to believe we weren’t the first people to try to find secrets in the trash.

Moving on we saw countless street-artists and performers who line the Croisette and its back streets. One particular entrepreneur grabs our attention with his eerie facial wood-carvings. For only a modest price (around 45 Euros) you could have your favourite family member or friend (or celebrity for that matter) incarcerated in wood that was reminiscent of Han Solo’s physical state at the end of The Empire Strikes Back. Creepy but kind of likeable in an odd way.

Wondering into the busy boutique-filled streets, Ross noticed the infamous Bela Erdie, or as he is known through the internet – ‘the Cat Man’. A few years back Bela was involved in a short documentary about his life entitled Bela: L’Homme in which a crew documented his daily routine of cat infused street performance (you can watch the doc here). We paid him in change for a few snaps and marvelled at the cuteness of his cats. Everything was going so well until an episode of ‘When Cats Attack’ was released onto my hands.

As the sun began to descend and we grew tired of all the superficiality, Ross and I headed home to prepare for the night’s screening. Then it happened. The little black box which converts batteries into beauty, decided to throw a wobbly and through a shower of sparks we were left powerless, and so… drowned our sorrows in a miserable sea of Sauvignon.