Champagne! The cinemas will reopen their doors Wednesday, May 19, with a curfew set at 9 p.m., after several months of closure – since October 30, 2020 – due to a pandemic. The image of this cinematographic “comeback” could be that of a bottle of sparkling wine a little too shaken, from which the impatient bubbles (the films) only aspire to burst. Because, from confinement to curfews, between 400 and 450 feature films have piled up on the shelves of distributors, who are waiting to meet their audience. This is the question.
Distributors will have to share the same pie (a total of 5,900 screens) with a greater number of works showing. At the big cinema banquet, it is not said that everyone will find their place, warns one of the co-chairs of the Syndicate of independent distributors, Etienne Ollagnier: “Will some large distributors agree to reduce the number of screenings for their own outings, in order to leave space for others? Or will those who already had only crumbs end up with half-crumbs? “, sums up the pattern of Jour2Fête.
American blockbusters are rare on the big screen, with the exception in particular of Black Widow, by Cate Shortland, with Scarlett Johansson, expected on July 7, the battle for the screens could be played out mainly on the scale of French cinema.
Outings On May 19, we make up for it: among the films released at the end of October 2020, whose exploitation has been cut short, a few stand out on the big screen: Goodbye idiots, by Albert Dupontel, who had achieved 700,000 admissions in one week and triumphed at the Césars (seven statuettes, including those for best film and best director), DNA, by Maïwenn, or even Rag Boy, by Nicolas Maury. Released February 12, 2020, Of them, by Filippo Meneghetti, a love story between two mature women, is again the bet of the room after winning the César for best first film in 2021.
Its pop and colorful poster has long haunted the corridors of the metro. Announced for December 16, 2020, Mandibles, by Quentin Dupieux, will finally experience the joys of the room on May 19. The master of the absurd (Rubber, Steak, Daim…) hopes to broaden its audience base with a fake teenage comedy with an eclectic cast (the comedy duo Grégoire Ludig and David Marsais, Adèle Exarchopoulos, India Hair, Romeo Elvis): two friends a little perched discover a giant fly in the trunk of a car and decide to dress it up to earn money … May 19 will also start the full retrospective of films by Iranian Abbas Kiarostami (1940-2016), at the Center Pompidou in Paris.
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