Cannes steps on its own toes by dressing down its red-carpet stars

Globe and Mail

16-05-2025

Strolling down the Croisette during the thick of the Cannes Film Festival, it can be exceedingly difficult to discern who is a celebrity and who is just someone pretending (and paying dearly) to be one for a night.
Ahead of Friday night's armada of high-profile premieres ⁠– including the dark comedy Eddington starring Joaquin Phoenix and Emma Stone and the Bono documentary Stories of Surrender ⁠– the streets leading up to the Grand Théâtre Lumière were lined with toned men rocking tuxedos and impeccably coiffed women dripping in semi-haute couture.
Some festival-goers were well-heeled locals and tourists out for a night of high-priced fun, their dropped jaws and knowing smiles giving the game away. Others were harried members of the press who frantically secured black-tie-ready outfits in the days leading up to premieres (guilty). But then there were the women wrapped into slinky gowns that seemed awfully close to real-deal Saint Laurent. The kind of prêt-à-porter that forces onlookers to twist their heads and wonder, 'Where have I seen her before... ?'
They might have been wealthy civilians simply milling around the fashion houses lining Rue d'Antibes ⁠– whose tenants include everyone from Armani to Zadig et Voltaire ⁠– or genuine celebrities of European provenance who couldn't be so easily clocked by visiting reporters (guilty again) because they operate outside the more familiar Hollywood star system.
It almost doesn't matter whether you have a genuine claim to Cannes fame, though – dressing the part is only half of this film festival's game. It's not only who you are, but who you are wearing – and just how you are wearing it.
Ahead of opening night this week, festival organizers made the surprise announcement that 'for decency reasons, nudity is prohibited on the red carpet, as well as any other area of the festival.'
While that restriction might seem fair and obvious, it was not as if Cannes was regularly being bombarded by birthday-suit celebrities a la Kanye West's wife Bianca Censori. Instead, the edict landed like a clumsy way of banning the so-called 'naked dress' trend of recent years, in which a gown is designed around the mere suggestion of exposure, and has become the favourite camera-ready style of everyone from model Bella Hadid to lauded actress Vicky Krieps. (And which some in the industry have convincingly framed as a celebration of bodily autonomy in Hollywood's hopeful post-#MeToo era.)
Also no longer welcome: any kind of 'voluminous outfit,' such as dresses with long trains that might cause traffic jams on the red carpet ⁠– not so much a real problem given that the festival is happy to afford a star like Tom Cruise however long he wants to sign fan autographs and generally hold up any red-carpet procession.
In other words, Cannes knows who it wants parading on the red carpet outside the Palais, inarguably the most prestigious patch of crimson coating in the entire world, and who it does not. Which, it turns out, includes members of its own festival jurors.
Upon learning the late-game news, Halle Berry – who is serving on this year's official competition jury alongside president Juliette Binoche – had to ditch a dress by Gaurav Gupta because it had too large a train.
'I'm not going to break the rules,' Berry said, though others were more defiant, including Heidi Klum, who stepped out in a pink Elie Saab gown with a cascading train designed to mimic floral petals. Klum and fellow rule-breaking actress Wan QianHui (outfitted in a overflowing Wang Feng gown) were admitted without issue, though word floating around the press corps this week was that other, less bold-faced names were not so lucky.
In 2015, controversy erupted when several female guests of the festival – some with medical conditions – were denied access to the red carpet because they weren't wearing the required heels. (The following year, Julia Roberts opted to walk barefoot.)
At the 2024 edition, Dominican actress Massiel Taveras got into an altercation with Cannes security over the length of her frock. And on and on the conflict goes – an odd source of tension for a festival whose very existence is synonymous with confrontational and rebellious artistic expression.
The ugly truth over this year's rules, though, feels as if it is hiding in plain, buck-naked sight: in an era of hyper-saturated social-media headlines, where one star's premiere-night wardrobe decision can overshadow the film or its hosts, Cannes desperately wants to wrest control of its own narrative back, and has regrettably decided that the best way to do so is by viewing any fashion decision through the twin prisms of prudism and misogyny.
Whatever their intentions and however they had hoped to frame them, Cannes organizers have stepped on their own frock-free feet here, adding a layer of backward conservatism to what is, and should continue to be, one of the most progressive events on the global cultural calendar.
Once a year, the denizens of Cannes – whether they are genuinely famous or famous-for-a-night – throw away their 9-to-5 wardrobes to celebrate the creative spirit. They don't deserve to be dressed down.
Making waves at the film festival heading into opening weekend:
• AI at the art-house: Quietly being shopped around the Marché du Film is The Great Reset, which producers are boasting as being the 'world's first AI-crafted photorealistic thriller,' made without cameras, physical sets or 'traditional' actors. Yikes.
• Affordable activations: Typically, at least one Hollywood studio will go big at Cannes and either rent out an entire hotel to throw a grand bash, or perhaps construct a grand marketing behemoth on the beach, a la the two-storey Top Gun: Maverick installation plunked down near the beach in 2022. This belt-tightening year, though, there's only a lone Mission: Impossible video installation in front of the Carlton Hotel.
• Palme predictions: Prognosticators are already trying to lock in their picks for the Palme d'Or winner. Currently in the lead is Joachim Trier's Sentimental Value, even though the drama won't premiere till Wednesday.