Striking a pose in billowing white couture and French lace on the Croisette at Cannes during the film festival. Photograph by Andrea Heinsohn for DAM.
The 78th Cannes International Film Festival offered far more
than red-carpet spectacle, its true spirit unfolded along the Croisette, where
street style, spontaneous encounters, and the tireless dance of photographers
created a living portrait of the festival. From fashion statements born in the
sunlit bustle to the charged energy surrounding daily premieres and seaside
happenings, Cannes revealed itself as a vibrant cultural stage where cinema,
style, and human moments intertwined, writes Antonio Visconti. Photography by Andrea Heinsohn
Ballgowns and jeans and t-shirts
all mix on the Croisette at Cannes.
IN Cannes, the annual film festival unfolded this
year with all the shimmering unpredictability that has long made the palm-lined Croisette
a stage as compelling as any cinema screen. While the red carpet remained the
festival’s ceremonial heart, the true story of Cannes played out on the
sun-washed boulevard outside the Palais des Festivals, where fashion, frenzy, and fleeting
moments converged in an irresistible daily performance.
From early morning, the Croisette became a runway of its
own, alive with actors, directors, producers and cinephiles dashing between
screenings and seaside cafés.
Street style at Cannes has always been a uniquely
global blend, but this year felt especially expressive: Italian linen
tailoring, sculptural Japanese silhouettes, Riviera-chic ensembles in sun-faded
blues, and bursts of couture-level glamour stepped straight off yachts and into
the crowd. The laissez-faire elegance of Cannes mingled seamlessly with
high-voltage fashion statements, oversized sunglasses, silk scarves fluttering
in sea breezes, metallic handbags catching the light like jewellery.
And then there were the photographers, a guild
whose energy shaped the atmosphere as much as any celebrity appearance.
Positioned along the red carpet, lining ladders above barricades, darting through the crowds, or crouched low on
pavements, they worked with a choreography all their own. Their lenses chased
everything: star arrivals, glimmers of vintage Chanel drifting past on
bicycles, unexpected reunions between directors, or simply a stranger whose
look demanded attention. In Cannes, anyone can suddenly become a subject. The
photographers know this better than anyone, and their instinct for spontaneity
is what gives the festival its pulse.
At dusk, a golden wash of Côte d'Azur sunlight illuminated the Croisette, turning the palm-lined boulevard into a cinematic frame
Photographers bring their own
ladders to capture all of the red
carpet action at the festival.
Throughout the day, the Croisette thrummed with
happenings, pop-up interviews, brand launches, and impromptu fashion shoots
unfolding against the Mediterranean backdrop. At dusk, a golden wash
illuminated the boulevard, turning every step into a cinematic frame.
Crowds
gathered outside the Palais as the evening premieres drew near, the
anticipation almost physical. Tourists craned for glimpses of stars, while
photographers jockeyed for position, shouting cues, adjusting lenses, and
capturing images destined to circulate worldwide within minutes.
Beyond the glamour, Cannes remained about human connection: actors
paused to greet fans; directors chatted with students; festival guests shared
laughter over gelato on the promenade. Our reportage captures these
contrasts, the grandeur of couture brushing against the easy charm of a festival
lived in the streets.
In the end, the 78th Cannes Film Festival was more than a
celebration of cinema. It was a living tableau: vibrant, unpredictable, and
visually intoxicating. And on the Croisette, every passerby, every flash of a
shutter, and every burst of Riviera light played a role in the ongoing
mythology of this French filmic icon.
Scroll down to see more moments from the Cannes Film Festival by Andrea Heinsohn
Research shows those who personalise items with their name worry more about being negatively judged than those who purchase non-customised items. Pictured is Italian entrepreneur Chiara Ferragni with her own name on a Dior tote.Cover picture by Andrea Heinsohn for DAM
By Anne-maree O'Rourke
You might think spending $5,000 on a handbag or wallet would be prestigious and exclusive enough. What about taking things one step further – and personalising it with your own name? Brands including Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Dior now offer extensive customisation options – some for a few products, others for their entire range. Names and initials are an obvious, popular choice.
Some have hailed personalisation as the future of luxury goods. But it’s worth asking – could there be any downsides?
Research has shown there’s a trade-off to signalling social status with luxury goods. Luxury consumers are often perceived as less warm and friendly, more concerned with managing their image.
Our recent research examined whether name-stamping could increase this social cost. Our findings suggest for some customers, it can – increasing their fears of being negatively judged.
One-of-a kind products
These personalised touches are marketed as unique, one-of-a-kind products. They’re designed to appeal to a desire for individuality and exclusivity.
For luxury buyers, customisation offers a way to showcase their personality, passions and interests. It can enhance their feelings of connection to a brand and sense of psychological ownership of an item.
A promotional video showing personalisation options for Dior’s “Book Tote”.
Enabling consumers to co-design a product can also help alleviate the impostor syndrome some consumers experience when buying high-end luxury items.
For the brands themselves, personalisation services can increase profit margins, improve market appeal and strengthen customer loyalty.
Much of this trend has been fuelled by millennial and Gen-Z luxury consumers, who are increasingly seeking out unique, tailor-made experiences.
Luxury brands are adapting to changing trends.Alya108k/Shutterstock
By 2030, it’s expected that millennials and Gen-Z will account for 60–70% of all luxury purchases.
A 2017 survey found more than half of millennials who’d recently made a luxury purchase were willing to pay more for personalised luxury goods.
We love our own names
The popularity of name-stamping, in particular, may come down to a concept called “implicit egotism”.
Research suggests most people have a subconscious positive association with themselves. This extends to a preference for things that are connected to their sense of identity – such as the letters of their own name.
The drawbacks of personalisation are less widely discussed. One clear one is its impact on resale value. Personalised items are harder to sell.
This is particularly relevant for Australia’s booming second-hand luxury market, driven by younger consumers prioritising sustainability and affordability.
Research also suggests that excessive customisation – letting customers make design decisions on custom colours, fabrics, and so on – can decrease the signalling value of luxury items and undermine their status appeal.
One popular choice is to personalise items with a customer’s name or initials.Screenshot from au.louisvuitton.com
Luxury’s social cost
Then there’s the cost that can come with luxury itself.
Research has shown luxury consumers can be perceived as less warm and friendly than those who forgo luxury.
Interestingly, this perception isn’t driven by envy. Rather, it stems from a belief that luxury wearers are actively managing their image to impress others.
Does name-stamping luxury increase this social cost even more? Our research, with co-authors Joanna Lin, Billy Sung and Felix Septianto, suggests the answer is yes.
Research suggests luxury goods can make the wearer seem less warm to others.Body Stock/Shutterstock
We conducted four studies with 1,354 female luxury and non-luxury shoppers from the United States.
We found consumers who personalise luxury items with their name worry more about being negatively judged than those who purchase non-customised items.
This effect was consistent, regardless of whether the personalisation featured initials or full first names.
The overtness of name personalisation, in particular, may explain the added social cost. Customising a bag with a non-standard colour might only catch the eye of a luxury brand enthusiast. A prominently displayed name, however, unmistakably signals customisation to everyone.
Not all fear judgement
Importantly, we found not all luxury consumers share this fear of judgement equally. The impact depends on individual motivations for purchasing luxury items to begin with.
Those who are motivated to consume luxury goods for social reasons, such as standing out, are less concerned about receiving negative judgement from others.
Some luxury customers don’t worry about negative judgement.Street style photo/Shutterstock
In contrast, those who are motivated to buy luxury items for more individual reasons are more wary of how name personalisation might be judged.
For this group, which made up about half of the consumers we sampled, subtle, customised touches could be a more appealing option.
There could also be some variation across different cultures.
A report by KPMG found Chinese consumers – a group not included in our study – often seek luxury consumption as a means of social advancement and self-differentiation, meaning they are likely less concerned about the social costs.
On the other hand, we could speculate that Australian consumers, influenced by the “tall poppy syndrome” cultural phenomenon, may be even more sensitive.
Anne-maree O'Rourke, Lecturer in Marketing, The University of Queensland
Leonardo Di Caprio, left, looks on as Robert De Niro accepts his Honorary Palme d'Or during the Cannes film festival and gives a speech critiquing the new proposed tariffs saying; 'You can't put a price on connectivity.' Photograph by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP. Cover picture by Andrea Heinsohn for DAM
By Gaelle Planchenault
With the 78th Cannes International Film Festival underway this week, there is little doubt that one topic will be central to conversations among filmmakers, sales agents and journalists: United States President Donald Trump’s threat to impose a 100 per cent tax on foreign-made films.
On the opening night, Hollywood icon, Robert De Niro set the tone as he accepted his honorary Palme d'Or award. He used his podium to critique Trump’s actions in the arts, especially Trump’s proposal to tax foreign-made films. He said: “…art is the crucible that brings people together…. Art looks for truth. Art embraces diversity. That’s why art is a threat.” He also added: “you can’t put a price on connectivity.”
Amid an ongoing tariff war, Trump’s proposal — which may ultimately remain an empty threat — goes beyond economic protectionism. It is cultural protectionism. It also reflects language ideologies that have long constrained the American film industry and American engagement with multilingual cinema.
Experts have offered various theories about the motivations behind this threat, as well as why it may ultimately prove unwise. In the rush to brace for impact, we often forget the values behind these extreme positions aren’t new. More importantly, we must also remember why it’s vital to protect these cultural expressions.
As a linguist, I see a clear connection between this proposal and one of the administration’s actions earlier this year, when Trump signed an executive order designating English as the country’s sole official language. This move reflected a deeply rooted monolingual ideology that has long influenced both the U.S. language policy and education systems.
Monolingual ideology
Such language ideology reflects a belief in the superiority of monolingualism, a view that American linguist Rosina Lippi-Green links to the “myth of Standard American English.”
This myth is grounded in the subordination by one dialect, believed to be of higher quality and status, over other languages and dialects. According to Lippi-Green, the enforcement of this ideology follows a systematic process: language is mystified, authority is claimed and a series of negative consequences ensue. Misinformation is generated, targeted languages are trivialized, non-conformers are vilified or marginalized and threats are made.
Such authority and threats are recognizable in this most recent threat to make access to foreign films difficult. The issue is not just about the economic dimension of foreign-made films. It is also about the perceived threat posed by the presence and influence of other languages. At its core, this reflects a fear or rejection of linguistic diversity.
In the film industry, this monolingual ideology is closely tied to glottophobic attitudes, also referred to by some scholars as linguicism. These terms define the misrepresentation and negative stereotyping of speakers of languages other than English.
Hollywood, in particular, has a long history of portraying foreign or heritage languages in stereotypical and often derogatory ways. Consider, for instance, the German-speaking characters in Second World War films, or more recent depictions of Arabic, Mexican Spanish or Russian speakers.
These portrayals illustrate a tendency to depict other languages as menacing — a point that was also made in the American president’s claim that foreign films pose a “threat” because they constitute “messaging and propaganda.”
A press image for the show Call My Agent which has been a global success.Netflix
Linguistic stereotyping
It’s not just characters who speak other languages who have been misrepresented in American films. Those who speak English as a second language — that is with an accent or with a syntax that is marked by their first language — were often played by white actors and subject to similar derogatory stereotypes.
Linguists have identified patterns in these linguistic representations, referring to them as Injun English, Mock Spanish or yellow voices, among others.
Lippi-Green has famously argued that such linguistic depictions are ways to reinforce standard language ideologies through linguistic stereotyping in media, including popular Disney cartoons. They effectively teach American children how to discriminate.
In my work, I examined French-accented English to demonstrate that these representations reflect broader cultural anxieties. Ultimately, this rhetoric reveals more about the U.S. relationship with linguistic diversity than it does about the communities being portrayed.
Trump has made reference to “any and all movies coming into our country that are produced in foreign lands.” But it remains unclear how such measures would impact streaming platforms and the diverse range of films they currently offer.
Hollywood has come a long way since the heydays of linguicism, gradually embracing a more inclusive and multilingual cinematic landscape. Today, films that present a more diverse linguistic landscape are increasingly common. And audiences are accustomed to having access to a wide selection of international content.
The global success of the French series Call My Agent is just one example. Among others are popular French spy thrillers and romances, Swedish thrillers, Japanese anime and Korean dystopian series.
The pleasure of watching foreign films
For years, foreign language films have been recognized as an invaluable resource for language learning. This fact is supported by language learning apps that increasingly recommend users to view TV programs or movies to support learning. Movies and TV provide access to a variety of dialects as well as authentic forms of language.
As a professor of French media and linguistics, I often use films to teach students about French language and culture. But beyond their educational benefits, foreign-language films offer unique esthetic and emotional pleasures.
Watching a film is to engage with sound and image. The language itself enhances the immersive experience, contributing to the authenticity of the storytelling. For example, one of my students told me he enjoys turning on closed captions in French. These are also known as SDH: Subtitles for the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing. He does this not just for the dialogue but because they capture the full cinematic experience, including the naming of sounds.
Restricting access to these cultural products would trap viewers in an ideological echo chamber, where only one language is heard and validated.
Fictional representations play a powerful role in shaping and reinforcing real-world attitudes. Monolingual representations potentially foster linguistic discrimination and intolerance toward any word uttered with an accent or in another language. In short, such restrictions could pave the way for a partial and stunted society.
Gaelle Planchenault, Associate Professor of French Media, Culture, and Applied Linguistics, Simon Fraser University
Giving AI a human face, voice or tone is a dangerous act of cross-dressing. It triggers an automatic response in us andromorphic reflex.
By Guillaume Thierry, Bangor University
We are constantly fed a version of AI that looks, sounds and acts suspiciously like us. It speaks in polished sentences, mimics emotions, expresses curiosity, claims to feel compassion, even dabbles in what it calls creativity.
But here’s the truth: it possesses none of those qualities. It is not human. And presenting it as if it were? That’s dangerous. Because it’s convincing. And nothing is more dangerous than a convincing illusion.
In particular, general artificial intelligence — the mythical kind of AI that supposedly mirrors human thought — is still science fiction, and it might well stay that way.
What we call AI today is nothing more than a statistical machine: a digital parrot regurgitating patterns mined from oceans of human data (the situation hasn’t changed much since it was discussed here five years ago). When it writes an answer to a question, it literally just guesses which letter and word will come next in a sequence – based on the data it’s been trained on.
This means AI has no understanding. No consciousness. No knowledge in any real, human sense. Just pure probability-driven, engineered brilliance — nothing more, and nothing less.
So why is a real “thinking” AI likely impossible? Because it’s bodiless. It has no senses, no flesh, no nerves, no pain, no pleasure. It doesn’t hunger, desire or fear. And because there is no cognition — not a shred — there’s a fundamental gap between the data it consumes (data born out of human feelings and experience) and what it can do with them.
Philosopher David Chalmers calls the mysterious mechanism underlying the relationship between our physical body and consciousness the “hard problem of consciousness”. Eminent scientists have recently hypothesised that consciousness actually emerges from the integration of internal, mental states with sensory representations (such as changes in heart rate, sweating and much more).
Given the paramount importance of the human senses and emotion for consciousness to “happen”, there is a profound and probably irreconcilable disconnect between general AI, the machine, and consciousness, a human phenomenon.
The master
Before you argue that AI programmers are human, let me stop you there. I know they’re human. That’s part of the problem. Would you entrust your deepest secrets, life decisions, emotional turmoil, to a computer programmer? Yet that’s exactly what people are doing — just ask Claude, GPT-4.5, Gemini … or, if you dare, Grok.
Giving AI a human face, voice or tone is a dangerous act of digital cross-dressing. It triggers an automatic response in us, an anthropomorphic reflex, leading to aberrant claims whereby some AIs are said to have passed the famous Turing test (which tests a machine’s ability to exhibit intelligent, human-like behaiour). But I believe that if AIs are passing the Turing test, we need to update the test.
The AI machine has no idea what it means to be human. It cannot offer genuine compassion, it cannot foresee your suffering, cannot intuit hidden motives or lies. It has no taste, no instinct, no inner compass. It is bereft of all the messy, charming complexity that makes us who we are.
More troubling still: AI has no goals of its own, no desires or ethics unless injected into its code. That means the true danger doesn’t lie in the machine, but in its master — the programmer, the corporation, the government. Still feel safe?
And please, don’t come at me with: “You’re too harsh! You’re not open to the possibilities!” Or worse: “That’s such a bleak view. My AI buddy calms me down when I’m anxious.”
Am I lacking enthusiasm? Hardly. I use AI every day. It’s the most powerful tool I’ve ever had. I can translate, summarise, visualise, code, debug, explore alternatives, analyse data — faster and better than I could ever dream to do it myself.
I’m in awe. But it is still a tool — nothing more, nothing less. And like every tool humans have ever invented, from stone axes and slingshots to quantum computing and atomic bombs, it can be used as a weapon. It will be used as a weapon.
Need a visual? Imagine falling in love with an intoxicating AI, like in the film Her. Now imagine it “decides” to leave you. What would you do to stop it? And to be clear: it won’t be the AI rejecting you. It’ll be the human or system behind it, wielding that tool become weapon to control your behaviour.
Removing the mask
So where am I going with this? We must stop giving AI human traits. My first interaction with GPT-3 rather seriously annoyed me. It pretended to be a person. It said it had feelings, ambitions, even consciousness.
That’s no longer the default behaviour, thankfully. But the style of interaction — the eerily natural flow of conversation — remains intact. And that, too, is convincing. Too convincing.
We need to de-anthropomorphise AI. Now. Strip it of its human mask. This should be easy. Companies could remove all reference to emotion, judgement or cognitive processing on the part of the AI. In particular, it should respond factually without ever saying “I”, or “I feel that”… or “I am curious”.
Will it happen? I doubt it. It reminds me of another warning we’ve ignored for over 20 years: “We need to cut CO₂ emissions.” Look where that got us. But we must warn big tech companies of the dangers associated with the humanisation of AIs. They are unlikely to play ball, but they should, especially if they are serious about developing more ethical AIs.
For now, this is what I do (because I too often get this eerie feeling that I am talking to a synthetic human when using ChatGPT or Claude): I instruct my AI not to address me by name. I ask it to call itself AI, to speak in the third person, and to avoid emotional or cognitive terms.
If I am using voice chat, I ask the AI to use a flat prosody and speak a bit like a robot. It is actually quite fun and keeps us both in our comfort zone.
Guillaume Thierry, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, Bangor University
If implemented, Trump's tariffs will have far reaching consequences on the film and television industry, but they are unlikely to make anyone more prosperous.
By Jean Chalaby, City St George's, University of London
With its tariffs policies, the administration of US president Donald Trump aims to correct the country’s persistent goods trade deficit. The president has argued that the US has been “looted, pillaged, raped and plundered” by other countries. Trump feels it is now America’s “turn to prosper” – and he has the film and TV industries in his sights with threats of 100% tariffs on foreign films.
Economists cite multiple reasons why tariffs are bad for economies, from stunting growth to adding inflationary pressure. But there is a more fundamental problem, which is notable in the case of the film and TV industries. While trade data reflects a country’s overall performance, it says nothing about the nature and ownership of the traded goods.
Indeed, the cross-border activities and foreign investments of US-based multinationals widen the US trade deficit. Global trade flows in film and TV are a good example.
In terms of the origin of a movie, it is determined by factors including the nationality of those in key creative roles, financing, filming location and the culture reflected in the theme and story. The US has long been the world’s largest exporter of films and TV, dominating global media flows for much of the 20th century.
In the 1970s, the country exported seven times as much film and TV programming as that of its nearest competitor (the UK). Three decades later, the US was still exporting 4.5 times the amount of content it imported – US$12.6 billion (£9.4 billion) versus US$2.8 billion.
US exports have increased, reaching US$24.7 billion in 2023, and Hollywood remains the world’s largest movie exporter. However, the US balance of trade in the sector has shifted dramatically. While US exports grew by 95.4% between 2006 and 2023, US imports increased by 898%.
The trade in film and TV programming achieved balance in 2019, and my research shows that since then, the US has imported more films and TV shows than it exported. The deficit was narrowing in 2023 but imports remained 12.1% higher than exports (US$27.7 billion versus US$24.3 billion).
This deficit deserves an explanation. Are Asian and European producers suddenly flooding the US with films and TV shows? Has the American public developed an insatiable appetite for Nordic noir or K-drama? The reality is that US-based media conglomerates like Disney, Netflix and Warner Bros Discovery have changed strategy. They have moved away from their previous focus on exports to direct-to-consumer international distribution.
What does this mean? Well, instead of licensing content to foreign broadcasters and cinemas (which they still do, but to a lesser extent), they retail their content internationally, using their own global streaming services.
The US entertainment paradox
Maintaining these large content libraries explains the shift of the US trade balance. US-based streamers export less because they now retain more of their content for exclusive distribution on their own streaming platforms. And they import more because they acquire foreign content in greater quantities than ever before.
For example, Stranger Things is produced by Netflix in the US. As such, it does not show up in export figures. Squid Game, on the other hand, is a Korean export and shows up in US import data.
Moreover, Walt Disney has decided to retain the exclusive rights to its franchises, forgoing licensing sales. In 2020, the company licensed 59% of its scripted series to third parties, 18% in 2021, and only 2% in 2022.
All the US streaming giants license and commission foreign content. Netflix in particular has spent more on international content than US programming since 2024 (US$7.9 billion versus US$7.5 billion). Hence the creation of a paradox: US trade data in audiovisual services reveals a trade deficit, yet the US-based entertainment industry has never been so dominant globally.
There are similar patterns in industries in which US-based multinationals are located at the apex of transnational supply chains. The jeans that Levi Strauss imports from Bangladesh, the trainers that Nike imports from Vietnam, and the car components Ford imports from Brazil all show up in US trade statistics. But these goods are, essentially, American-owned assets.
About 70% of trade involves global value chains (GVC), as raw materials and components cross borders multiple times before being assembled into a final product.
In today’s global economy, the complexity of most products requires companies to cooperate along transnational production networks. As businesses and countries specialise in specific tasks, GVCs are the most efficient way of producing goods and services. The streaming industry simply mirrors these wider patterns.
Mindful of the US trade deficit in films and TV programmes, Trump announced the plans for 100% tariffs on all films produced outside the US. However, his attempt to “make Hollywood great again” is misguided.
While Hollywood has new rivals to contend with, notably South Korea, it remains the world’s largest film and TV exporter. Following a short period of decline in the late 2010s, US exports have continued to grow to reach a record US$24.3 billion.
For Trump, the vexing issue is that the US imports more films and TV programmes than its exports. But that is due to US-based platforms’ foreign content hoarding. Adolescence and Squid Game have indeed contributed to extending the gap between US imports and exports, but they are US-owned assets that have earned Netflix hundreds of millions of dollars in subscription fees. (Squid Game’s impact value for Netflix was estimated at US$891 million in 2021.)
Squid Game is an import, but it’s a giant money-spinner for US streamer Netflix.
And American content on US-based streaming giants does not show up in trade data. The whole world is watching Black Mirror and Ransom Canyon, but these series have never been exported. Rather, they are on a global platform (Netflix). US-based media conglomerates have never been so dominant in the global media market.
In short, trade data does not tell the whole story. If implemented, these tariffs will certainly have far-reaching consequences for the film and TV industry. But they are unlikely to make anyone more prosperous.
Jean Chalaby, Professor of Sociology, City St George's, University of London
