Michele Maheux, director of communications at Cinemateque Ontario, is in France this month for the International Film Festival of Cannes. At press time, midway through the fest she filed this report.

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Cannes: At the halfway point of the International Film Festival of Cannes, the competition is mediocre at best, the weather is not cooperating, and pretty well everyone is cranky about the organization (or lack thereof) of this year’s special 50th edition of the revered festival.

The city of Cannes has pulled out all the stops this year and even put garbage crews on all-night duty to ensure the Croisette remains pristine for this golden anniversary of the biggest and most important of annual film festivals.

‘Official’ seems to be the theme at this year’s festival: there are at least two official tomes celebrating the event, at least one official video, a cd-rom, an official car supplier, an official florist (to arrange 10,000 red roses adorning the red carpeted stairs for French President Jacques Chirac’s Sunday visit), an official fireworks display, and a number of official receptions hosted by the president of the festival to fete just about everything.

The official opening night bash (feting Luc Besson’s sci-fi extravaganza The Fifth Element starring Bruce Willis) was held in an airplane hanger-type structure built specifically for the festival ­ entry was gained by presenting an official Swatch watch (your invitation), which was then scanned to ensure authenticity.

And the official reception and photo shoot of all the Palm d’Or winners featured 30 of the world’s most celebrated directors, including the only woman filmmaker ever to receive the award, Jane Campion, front and center. For a real cinephile, it truly was an event to remember.

Star power has been better this year than in recent years, with the opening of the new Planet Hollywood (right next door to the relatively new MacDonald’s) drawing not a few familiar faces, causing quite a stir, and providing Willis and Demi Moore with an excuse to extend their visit to make nice with the media and adoring crowds.

But no one could compete last week with the appearance of the most anticipated of all arrivals ­ not President Chirac, but Michael Jackson.

Here to promote Ghosts (a short film which cleverly resembles a sequel to the sensational Thriller video), Jackson was the hit of the festival to date, causing traffic jams up and down the Croisette as his faithful steadfastly refused to leave the area surrounding the swish Carlton Hotel until he bestowed the regal wave upon the crowd from his upper-floor balcony.

The crush at the late-night screening of the 40-minute short was rivaled only by that for the screening of Johnny Depp’s feature directorial debut, The Brave.

Chirac attended much of Sunday’s anniversary celebration but departed before the evening program, during which the festival bestowed the Palm of Palms to Ingmar Bergman for his life’s work. The seven most influential women in his life (including Liv Ullmann and six of the many actresses he has worked with during his career) were all on hand to pay moving tribute to the master.

Unfortunately, his age and ill health prevented Bergman from attending. However, this did not keep the capacity crowd from affording him a standing ovation in response to the heartfelt emotional message delivered to the crowd by his daughter, who accepted the award on his behalf. This marks Bergman’s seventh award from the festival since 1947 when he received a special mention for A Ship Bound For India.

On the film front, the official competition has proved to be underwhelming, by many kind estimates. Compared to last year, the 1997 edition is sadly lacking, although the last couple of days have allowed for some optimism with showings of both Shohei Imamura’s The Eel (Japan) and Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm (u.s.). Touted from the beginning for a jury honor is the Abbas Kiarostami film The Taste of Cherries ­ a late addition replacing the Zhang Yimou film which was forced to drop out for political reasons.

The Canadians have much to be proud of this year, however, with a number of films in official sections and Atom Egoyan’s The Sweet Hereafter in the competition. Already, Lynne Stopkewich’s Kissed screened to a warm reception by the first sell-out crowd at the Directors’ Fortnight, and the omnibus Cosmos from a collection of six talented young Montreal directors has been equally well received in the same prestigious section of the festival.

Love and Death in Long Island by Richard Kwietniowski in Un Certain Regard has also generated very good word of mouth from the media and industry alike.

The administration of the festival seems to have the entire accredited industry on edge this year, with tickets and information harder to come by than ever. If registration and getting to screenings was hard before, this year has set a new standard for frustration.

‘It’s a shell game this year,’ laments Telefilm Canada’s Jean Lefebvre. ‘This is a festival for the French paid for by foreigners ­ you really have to know where and how to get tickets this year. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it this bad, and on top of it all, the screenings aren’t even full.’

The market, on the other hand, seems to have finally organized itself this year and the results are obvious.

‘The market administration is obviously listening to its constituents and is giving them what they want,’ says Lefebvre.

At the halfway point, the industry at large is still predicting a mediocre market, although at a glance, the caliber of films seems to have improved over the past few years. It’s too early to estimate the market’s success, but Canada has much to be proud of ­ a strong showing of at least a dozen new films debuting in the market.

The list includes Gillies MacKinnon’s remarkable Regeneration, based on Pat Barker’s highly regarded novel, from Norstar, and cfp’s The Kid, produced by Richard Goudreau’s Melenny Productions and directed by John Hamilton (Myth of the Male Orgasm).

Also featured is a slate from Paragon/HandMade Films, North American Releasing, Behaviour Communications (formerly Malofilm), Alliance and more.