Cannes Won’t Have Lars Von Trier To Kick Around Anymore

Oh Lars.

The incendiary Danish director Lars von Trier has been banned from the Cannes Film Festival after he made some (predictably) provocative remarks at the press conference for his new, in competition film Melancholia. Here’s what he said:

It seems pretty damn obvious that von Trier is kind of joking around about discovering his own German heritage, about his dislike for Susanne Bier, and then about his own foot in mouth comments. It’s weird seeing people get up in arms about this; there’s no way to take anything that von Trier said as an endorsement of Nazism or anti-Semitism, and he even says that his comments shouldn’t be taken that way.

But of course it’s the press so everybody gotta make a big deal. These fucking vultures need SOMETHING to get up in arms/snarky about and get pageviews. And now von Trier can’t come within 100 meters of the Festival Palais and red carpet, and that he can’t come to the awards ceremony. Melancholia is technically still in competition, so if it should (by some miracle at this point) win, von Trier won’t be there to get his award.

Nobody is sure if von Trier is banned from ever having another film at Cannes. “I hope not,” Von Trier told the Hollywood Reporter. “Because even if I was Hitler – and I must now state for the record I am not Hitler – but even if I was Hitler and I made a great film, Cannes should select it.” Oh Lars. That’s not gonna help.

This shit is going to blow over, and Melancholia (and The Five Obstructions, which Magnolia preemptively bought for US distro) will get released and the usual people will love it and the usual people will hate it and we’ll all move on and Lars von Trier will still be one of the most interesting filmmakers working today. And one of the most inflammatory. But that’s part of why I love him so much. I mean, the guy has ‘FUCK’ tattooed on his knuckles.