AS THE world’s biggest names in the film industry flocked to the Cannes Film Festival, it was some of Scotland’s best talent that stole the limelight on this year’s red carpet.
Founded in 1946, the invitation-only festival is held annually in the resort town of Cannes on the French Riviera, and attracts some of Hollywood's biggest names along with the world’s most respected studios.
The festival is seen as one of the best stages for filmmakers to preview their latest work, with the event's awards seen as some of the most prestigious in the global film industry.
Despite all the Hollywood A-listers and the harbour full of mega-yachts, it was a group of Scottish filmmakers who managed to stand out at the Promenade de la Croisette, the main setting where the Cannes Film Festival is held.
Filmmaker Ian Gordon, along with cinematographer Alexander Henderson, writer and director Robbie Davidson, and actor Gary Allan, all donned Scotland’s national dress and turned heads throughout the seaside town in their kilts.
“You're walking around the place, and there's literal supermodels and people in these crazy outfits that look like something out of Eurovision, but we were the ones that were turning heads,” Davidson told the Sunday National.
“We were just getting scores of people asking to get the photo with us; it was a good icebreaker.”
With the group of independent filmmakers looking to network and secure new international contacts while promoting Scotland’s film industry, one of the country’s best-known names was also in attendance this year, but as a judge.
The award-winning screenwriter Paul Laverty joined the likes of American actress and producer Demi Moore and South Korean director Park Chan-wook on the jury for the 79th instalment of the festival.
Laverty, a previous winner of the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Screenplay, is best known for his collaborations with Ken Loach and his work on The Wind That Shakes the Barley and I, Daniel Blake.
He said that for him, the Cannes Film Festival is a beacon of hope amid a time of global uncertainty and violence.
“We arrive in Cannes in very strange times,” Laverty told the festival.
“I think Shakespeare summed it up perfectly when he said, tis the times plague when madmen lead the blind.
“I think all around us, we just see absolute chaos and systematic violence, venality and vulgar leaders around the world.
“We even actually see genocide taking place around us with the two rogue states, the United States and Israel in particular and in many other places of the world, collaboration with these war criminals.”
Laverty added: “To come to Cannes at a time like this, I think is really important because it's a celebration of what we can be, the good things in us.
“It's a celebration of possibility, it's a celebration of hope.
“It looks at the contradictions, the nuances, and essentially what a film does, I think, is it asks you to put yourself in another person's shoes and try and understand the world from their point of view.
“So, it's the opposite of these crazy leaders we have just now, these madmen leading the blind. It's the best of us.
“It's trying to understand each other and all our diversity, and it's got wit and the possibility of intelligence and fun and humour, whatever film that we have, whether it's horror or comedy.
“But somehow at the end of the day, we're still asking that big question of putting ourselves in another person's shoes, so to do that in these times, I just think is really, really important, and that's why I said, I think it's hopeful.”
With hundreds of filmmakers descending on Cannes each year, the festival is a celebration of a wide variety of genres and subject matter.
Some of this year’s highlights include Polish director Paweł Pawlikowski’s film Fatherland, which follows a German novelist returning home in 1949 having fled the Nazis and a documentary about Diego Maradona’s legendary handball against England in the 1986 World Cup.
However, amid all the red carpet events and film screenings, the festival is seen as a golden opportunity for filmmakers to meet and pitch to some of the industry’s biggest players.
The director behind the fantasy adventure movie The Gudeman, Gordon, said that being out in Cannes gave him the opportunity to meet people from all over the world.
“I contacted dozens of distributors before we went, and not a lot of them got back to me, so because it's really difficult to get anybody, I thought let's go out and let's knock on doors,” he said.
“We did have a couple of meetings set up, but we managed to get a lot more just by being there.”
Gordon added that the group all had a “really successful” time meeting people from across the industry.
Davidson echoed Gordon’s sentiment as he said he was given strong feedback for his pitch of creating a follow-up for what has been described as one of the maddest films to come out from Scotland, Dick Dynamite 1944.
With a budget of just £10,000, Davidson was able to create an action-packed Second World War film featuring Nazis, zombies, and cyborgs, which has gained a cult following among film fans.
“After our talks in Cannes, we might be going with a slightly different option, a slight, kind of offshoot,” Davidson teased.
The filmmaker, who is also in the punk band The Exploited, explained he has the full script for the second instalment of Dick Dynamite, with several drafts already whittled down while on the road touring.
“I got the sort of feedback on what works and what sells, and they were talking about a particular element that if we add it to the dynamite stuff, then it will massively increase the likelihood of it getting funding and being made.”
Davidson, who despite being knocked back for official accreditation, was still not able to move a couple of feet down the promenade without meeting someone in the industry who wanted to speak with him, as he was dressed in his kilt.
He added: “If we give the potential funders what they want, it might lend itself to be even more ludicrous and extreme.”
