Cannes movies Triangle of Sadness and Armageddon Time critique privilege, using vomit and Trumps.

Mounting a critique of privilege at a film festival is inevitably an exercise in friendly fire. As one critic for Slate France put it, en français, “I haven’t seen that much vomit since Jackass 3D.” The BBC’s review wondered if Triangle of Sadness might be “the most disgusting film of 2022”—this in the same week as the debut of a new body horror film from David Cronenberg—but they meant it as a compliment. Although a handful of boos got the movie labeled “divisive”—the ideal result for a director whose brand is as a provocateur—it still seems, days later, a leading contender for the festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or. The closest it comes to self-reflection is when Woody Harrelson’s yacht captain, a drunken leftist who screams quotations from Karl Marx and Edward Abbey during an argument, admits he can’t be a good socialist, because “I have too much stuff.” By contrast, perennial Cannes favorite James Gray, back at the festival for his fifth time, is everywhere in Armageddon Time, the semi-autobiographical story of a kid from Queens whose blue-collar family’s social aspirations lead them down an ultimately monstrous path. At the press conference for Armageddon Time, Gray was blunt about the film’s subject: “It’s impossible to look at the world,” he said, “and not see white privilege as one of the guiding mechanisms that are in existence.” But the industry bible Variety speculated that the movie’s depiction of “racial inequalities” might “turn off awards voters,” and the Hollywood Reporter said that its post-premiere ovation lasted a scant four minutes.