Magic Red-Carpet Rides.

MOTION picture industry; MOTION pictures; FILM festivals; ACTORS; PITT, Brad, 1963-; TARANTINO, Quentin, 1963-; GODARD, Jean-Luc, 1930-2022; WONG Kar-Wai, 1958-; ZHANG, Yimou, 1951-; KUSTURICA, Emir; O'TOOLE, Peter, 1932-2013; MOORE, Michael, 1954-; ACTIVISTS; AWARDS

CANNES (France); FRANCE

This article discusses movies and politics at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. Bronzed and buffed, his hair a golden mane, he looks like a cross between a Greek god and a sun-bleached surfer. After Troy's premiere, Brad Pitt is holding court just steps away from another fabled Mediterranean beach--at a press conference in Cannes. While stardust may, in the end, be nothing more than dust, the Cannes International Film Festival is one place where the Hollywood dream is incarnated with Olympian grandeur. Cannes is the high altar of world cinema, where each night thousands of French fans, avid pilgrims, gather to watch the stars climb a red-carpet stairway to heaven. In his new documentary, Moore--who premiered the Oscar-winning Bowling for Columbine in Cannes two years ago--takes a controversial look at Sept. 11, pointing a finger at oil-lubricated links between the Bush White House and the Saudi royal family.