Cannes Officials Need to Look Inward While They Denounce Harvey Weinstein
Cannes Film Festival director Thierry Fremaux and prez Pierre Lescure are the latest film industry figures to publicly decry Harvey Weinstein. In a joint statement to The Hollywood Reporter, Fremaux and Lescure emphasized: “We have been dismayed to learn of the accusations of harassment and sexual violence recently leveled against Harvey Weinstein, a film professional whose activity and success are well known to all. They have led him to make frequent visits to Cannes over many years, with numerous films selected at the International Film Festival, at which he has been a familiar figure.”
“These actions point to a pattern of behavior that merits only the clearest and most unequivocal condemnation,” Fremaux and Lescure said. “Our thoughts go out to the victims, to those who have had the courage to testify and to all the others. May this case help us once again to denounce all such serious and unacceptable practices.”
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Fremaux and Lescure are so much a part of the problem that their condemning Weinstein is almost laughable.
Here are some thoughts I have on the hypocrisy of the Cannes Film Festival:
“When my colleagues and I make our way to morning screenings at Cannes, we pass sex workers returning from their night. Wealthy men at the festival routinely ask publicists to find and send starlets to their yachts or events. Cannes’ red carpet is a textbook case of how a woman’s value is based solely on how she looks. And let’s not forget that the fest refuses to even include a space for working women with children.
Fremaux and Lescure would be smart to examine their own culpability in the misogynist culture that allowed Weinstein to abuse women for decades. Cannes, if you want to be a part of the solution, say that your next festival will be all women-directed — there have been plenty that have been completely directed by men.
Writing this probably means I won’t receive a press pass to Cannes next year, but I’m beyond caring. I am done with people who are complicit casting stones in glass houses by speaking out against Weinstein. It’s time they look at at themselves.”
The contents of this post were originally published as tweets. You can find me on Twitter @melsil.
