【1999 Archives】

Netflix at the Cannes Film Festival999 Archives And what's this ... a TELEVISION SHOW TOO? Sacré bleu, is nothing sacred? Or for that matter, bleu?

We kid, we kid.

Netflix has earned this place at the Croisette, between spending hundreds of trillions of dollars at the Sundance Film Festival and hiring a legit Hollywood suit to run its movies division. As for television playing among the fancy froo-froo movies, well ... we all know that TV > movies these days.

The Cannes Film Festival, just a little more than a month away, announced its entire lineup on Thursday. While it was short on blockbusters, it raised eyebrows with the first invite for Netflix and some small-screen fare to boot.

Netflix finally got its big shiny invite with two original films, actually: Okja, a monster movie from Snowpiercerdirector Bong Joon Ho starring Tilda Swinton and Jake Gyllenhaal, and The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected), a Noah Baumbach joint starring Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller and Dustin Hoffman.

Netflix just bought Meyerowitza couple of days ago (so it probably got in on its merits) while Okja has been in the streaming giant's stable since production. Both films are in competition for the prestigious Palme d'Or, and each launches on Netflix later this year alongside a limited theatrical release -- which is likely something the Cannes committee required for their consideration.

(Meanwhile, Netflix rival Amazon -- which has been a lot friendlier to the theatrical model -- has been at Cannes before, and is back for the 70th edition with Todd Haynes' Wonderstruck.)

Streaming services crashing the big cinephile party is one thing, but television? It's been creeping into the film-festival circuit for a few years now -- Sundance in particular, where the first season of Top of the Lakepremiered a couple of years ago -- and Cannes has finally caved.

Cannes will hold special screenings of Top of the Lake: China Girl(Season 2 of the Sundance Channel/BBC show), which will screen in its entirety; and the first two episodes of the Twin Peaksrevival, which is coming to Showtime this summer.

Lest anyone think this presents a prestige problem for Cannes, consider: Twin Peaksco-creator David Lynch and Top of the Lakecreator Jane Campion are both past Palme d'Or winners; Lynch for Wild at Heartin 1990 and Campion for The Pianoin 1993.

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