Life After Cannes: France’s Government Is Saving the Movies Better Than Hollywood (Column)

Fifteen years ago, I made my first trip to the Cannes Film Festival and spent two intense weeks consumed by cinema.

It was a chaotic experience dominated by exhaustion and attempts to stay awake and consume as many movies as possible.

After a dizzying ride through screenings of everything from “4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days” to “No Country For Old Men” and “Secret Sunshine,” I had a hard time processing the world outside of dark, crowded rooms.

And I couldn’t wait to return.Back home, my euphoria gave way to frustration and envy.

Cannes rolled out the red carpet for auteurs and treated cinema as high art; even in New York, movies felt like a much smaller piece of the cultural equation.

What gives? The answer, of course, comes down to money.

It helps to have a government with formidable resources invested in the arts, as France does, and

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