Last month, the 48th César Awards ceremony took place and alongside trophies given to recent releases, David Fincher was bestowed the Honorary César. It looks like the director––who is in post-production on his Michael Fassbender-led crime thriller The Killer ahead of a November release––took the honor seriously as he watched all the Best Film nominees: Pacifiction, Forever Young, Rise, The Innocent, the evening’s winner The Night of the 12th.
Across the viewings, the only one he appreciated (apologies, Louis Garrel) was reportedly Albert Serra’s Pacifiction. Star of the film and César Best Actor winner Benoît Magimel told Allocine that he went to a dinner featuring Fincher and Brad Pitt, who relayed the kind words about the film. Magimel said, “[Brad Pitt told me]: ‘David Fincher is pretty tough. In twenty years, I must have seen him about five times happy to see a film. Meaning, he doesn’t like anything.’ He said to me, ‘This guy doesn’t like anything, but Pacifiction, he loved it.’
Aside from an older list of his all-time favorites, Fincher usually stays fairly tight-lipped about the films he admires––though, with Pitt’s reveal, it sounds like he doesn’t have many kind words to say about most of what he sees. As for his adoration of Pacifiction, I have to agree. The mesmerizing odyssey, which is now in U.S. theaters from Grasshopper Film, was far and away one of the best theatrical experiences I’ve had in the past year.
As Rory O’Connor said in his review, ”Pacifiction is what Albert Serra might describe as an unfuckable movie. “Unfuckable is, you take the whole thing or you don’t take it but you cannot apply a critical judgment in an easy way,” he explained to us in 2019, “because it is what it is and it doesn’t look like any other film.” Pacifiction does not look like any other film. It doesn’t taste or smell like other films, either, even Serra’s own distinctive body of work. It premiered in a Cannes competition that has been high on wattage but low on power, crying out for a sensation. Pacifiction is that sensation: a film unlike any other this year, appearing near the end of proceedings, with the festival’s final furlongs already in sight; it is the closest the selection has come to delivering a masterpiece.”
Check out videos from the ceremony below, featuring Pitt’s introduction and Fincher’s acceptance speech, and read our recent interview with Serra here.
Last but not least, we also got a small update on The Killer, which Netflix will release this November: