Tonight’s Palme d’Or victor at Cannes is a tough call: it’s between Jacques Audiard’s A Prophet, Jane Campion’s Bright Star, Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon and The Time That Remains by the Palestinian Elia Suleiman. I’d like to see the last movie win, not only because it’s very good, but to make up for Waltz with Bashir, yet another fine Middle Eastern movie, which should have won last year.

This year the chairman of the jury is French (Isabelle Huppert), as was last year’s winner, The Class, so it might seem chauvinistic for the French to triumph again. I admired Bright Star, the story of the love affair between John Keats and Fanny Brawne, but was not smitten. Well acted, well directed and well shot, it lacked a point. I was amused when its producer, Jan Chapman, told me she was determined not to make a costume drama. What? Brawne (Abbie Cornish) parades in about 30 different outfits. I know she was a good seamstress, but she was only 18 and her mum was widowed, with two other youngsters to bring up. How was this not a “frocks” movie?

In stark contrast was another British film, Fish Tank, directed by Andrea Arnold. Set in and around a dire Essex housing estate, it’s most notable for the extraordinary debut by 17-year-old Katie Jarvis as its central character. She was spotted by the casting director having a row with her boyfriend on a Tilbury railway platform. From station to stardom for Jarvis, who could not attend Cannes because she has just given birth to her first child. Arnold delivered my favourite remark at the festival when asked by some clever-clogs European critic if Fish Tank had been influenced by Truffaut’s 400 Blows. “Don’t know the film — sorry,” she replied. “Perhaps I should go to my local video shop and get it out.”

Also plucked from obscurity was Gabourey Sidibe, who plays a heavily overweight youngster from Harlem in the American film Precious, which also features an unlikely Mariah Carey as a social worker. It was the most watchable film at Cannes.

Cantona and Loach were both beaming that Looking for Eric had been well received. It may not be Loach’s very best, but it will be his most commercially successful.

Rebecca O’Brien, the producer, told me that Cantona had rung her five years ago, but she was out and he simply left a message with her assistant, but no contact number. It was late 2006 when the French production company Why Not came back with Cantona’s plan. The lead actor, Steve Evets, was also never told Cantona was going to be in the film. No wonder he looked so shocked by the former footballer’s first appearance.

Alex Ferguson has seen the movie, though it is primarily about FC United of Manchester, the club supported by those who can't afford Old Trafford seats. Even so, the Man Utd team has been invited to the premiere on June 1 at Salford’s Vue.

Lars Von Trier has, apparently, been suffering from depression. Making Antichrist was his way, he explained, of getting out of his black moods. He should have stayed in bed and not shot this bad film. Pedro Almodovar has also had his health problems — migraines — though these, it seems, inspired his Broken Embraces. He has clearly been in too many darkened rooms for this indulgent noir movie.

Remakes were announced of both Mona Lisa and The Long Good Friday, two cult British films set to be transferred to America. The new Mona Lisa will star Mickey Rourke, with a New York backdrop; the new The Long Good Friday will be made in Miami. But why? These two great films should simply be left untouched. I also heard that Terry Gilliam, whose The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus was shown out of competition on Friday night, is to resurrect his Don Quixote, a madcap scheme that the former Python member tried to shoot back in 2000, before it fell apart.

Best party (well, one I was not banned from for being a pesky old hack) was the Soho House/Grey Goose vodka (note the generous namechecks) at La Napoule castle. Guests included Robin Wright Penn and Quentin Tarantino, whose Inglourious Basterds (correct namecheck) was shown on Wednesday night. A wildly uneven film.

richard.brooks@sunday-times.co.uk

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