By Isabella Walker
The emotions were high and positive as the night started with special guests, Meryl Streep, Greta Gerwig, Juliette Binoche, and many more. The house was full of well-known directors, actors, and actresses, producers.
The jury introduced the jury for the 77th Festival de Cannes including Ebru Ceylan, Lily Gladstone, Eva Green, Nadine Labaki, Juan Antonio Bayona, Pierfrancesco Favino, Kore-eda Hirokazu, Omar Sy, and on top of that Greta Gerwig as head chair. As well as that, the cast of the second act, Léa Seydoux, Vincent Lindon, Louis Garrel, and Raphaël Quenard with Director, Quentin Dupieux. Everyone’s smiles big and wide for the opening ceremony, people were itching in their seats to catch the opening movie.
Meryl Streep was announced winning the Festival’s Honorary Palme d’Or award. Captivating speeches made by Meryl as well as Greta Gerwig brought the audience to moving emotions as their applause erupted throughout the Palais.
The second act, a comedic French film directed by Quentin Duplex was not only funny but had a switch in directing throughout the movie. The actors confronted the directors and cameramen in the movie talking directly to them. Raphaël Quenard’s acting was not only funny but very captivating and intriguing with his humorous remarks and show of his personality in the film.
However, the film slowly built up to its climax and the plot was hard to follow as they switched from acting in the movie they were filming to who they were outside the film talking to the cameramen.
The film is filmed in what seems to be the 1950s with no phones, old-fashioned decor, and older cars played a role in evoking nostalgia for the audience who grew up in that time as well as evoking a specific mood and style that compliments the story being told by the Director. Their choice of location seems to capture the realistic aspects of the story and visually captivate their audience as well as mirroring the emotional journey of the “extra” in the film.
The plot starts with a man and a woman having a complicated but what seems to be a realistic relationship nowadays of the man getting tired of dealing with the neediness of the woman and trying to pawn her off to his friend. It went on to introduce the father of the woman and all of them sitting at a restaurant where they were served wine and the “extra” in the film was shaking as he poured the drink, spilling it everywhere. It went on for quite some time and it felt slow and confusing.
The end of the acting part of the film had the server fake shoot himself with a gun outside the restaurant and when the act was done he came back alive. Although being seen as an extra and being put in a role that created nerves and stress, and also being made fun of, wanting to find friends, and feeling pretty lonely in life, he ended up shooting himself at the end of the movie which emphasized how he felt throughout the film. Although confusing, the meaning behind it was supposed to be emotional for the difference between the other actors being paid well and happy at the end whereas he was stressed inside and outside the acting role.
The ending scene was a slow and long-moving view of train tracks as the rails began to break and fewer and fewer rails were seen as the train moved. This could have meant that a comedic but dark movie shows that life is more fragile and unpredictable amidst humor and cancel-culture jokes. The rails breaking off and slowly lessening in numbers is ironic because the audience may have expected the movie to end light and positively, but ended with a sort of impending and unpredictable danger as the tracks broke.
The applause after the film was there but compared to other Festival films, was short and light emphasizing the audience’s confusion and view on the acting.
The Second Act is a dark but humorous movie with hidden meanings, cancel culture that is apparent in the current day, 2024 and outlandish but funny remarks that had the audience laughing in their seats.
