Live from the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. When Cotsner reveals Kevin

Cannes, Monday morning, 8:15 a.m. A small crowd of journalists hurry to reach the press session in time where the first episode of Horizon: An American Saga, a cinematic fresco on the conquest of the West, produced and directed by Kevin Costner. In the projection room, critics from all over the world took their seats. The lights go out and we are carried away, for three hours, into the great adventure of the pioneers. “The conquest of the West was very complicated for those who experienced it: migrants from Europe, Africa and Asia had to learn to live together. They did not share the same language or the same culture and they lived in very difficult conditions. Violence was pervasive and there were few laws to contain it. I tried to write the best western possible by adding adventure, realism, compassion and humor,” the director will tell us a few minutes after the end of the film, at a press conference. Because as soon as the lights come back on, we are directed to the room where we can meet the American star.

Another spectacle, that of celebrity, then plays out as always at the Cannes festival. In front of the conference room, dozens of fans, smartphones in hand, await the arrival of Kevin Costner. Inside, 80 members of the national and international press are also waiting for the actor-director of Dancing with the wolves (1990) and Open Range (2003). “He’s arriving, he’s arriving… he’s taking his plane straight after for America… he has to resume filming the third episode… we’re counting on the relevance of your questions…” slips the communications staff who stage the arrival of the star. We can already hear the noise of the crowd in the hallway: “Kevin! Kevin! Kevin!” Photographers adjust their cameras. Great silence in our ranks: the charismatic actor makes his entrance. Confident approach and irresistible azure gaze which, when it meets yours, shows striking intensity. The American myth is relaxed, cool and laughing. He talks about his passion for American history, his current search for funds to finance the final episodes of his saga and even the presence of his son in the film's cast.

It's palpable in the audience: Kevin Costner's charisma is working. But the most striking moment is this moment when a Brazilian journalist asks to speak and declares, moved, his great admiration for the star: “With my wife, we wanted to call our son Kevin. (…) Do you realize your situation in society? You are a very important figure…” To this, the director responds: “I am known almost everywhere in the world, but if we put all that aside for a few seconds, we realize that we all have a lot of things going on. common in this room. You see me as someone famous. But that's not how I see myself. Like many of you I imagine, I love being surrounded by my loved ones. (…) I am a director, but I am also a father who loves filming his children's Christmas shows at school on a smartphone. (Smiles) And if I get up every morning, it is to work as best as possible, overcoming the difficulties that I encounter, like everyone else. You, me, the spectators, we are all connected by the same humanity. Let's not forget it. This is what I try to convey in my films.”

In a few moments, Kevin Costner has just revealed himself with simplicity, being authentic and close. But very quickly, people become agitated around him. His intervention is precise, he must say goodbye to us. The actor gets up, greets us and puts his dark glasses back on. Outside the room, in the corridor where he appears, he approaches his fans who form a thick wall around him, so many of them are waiting for him. The “Kevin, this way!” are starting again with a vengeance. And the journalists come out in single file before dispersing to see other Cannes lights shine and share them with you.