Jackie Chan almost wanted to quit acting and start doing charity work after the Wenchuan earthquake. But he has now decided to show the world, he says. “Tomorrow we have a big meeting with some directors, some scriptwriters. Why? I want to make the movie about the earthquake because there are so many touching stories,” Chan said at a press conference in London. “Every story I’ve seen just makes me cry…I believe there are so, so many touching stories. So tomorrow we’re going to have a big meeting to see what happens. I want through the movie to show the whole world, I really want to salute the whole army of China, really,” he said.

Obviously, he was very emotional about the whole drama. He wants to make the movie to raise money for the victims. And he already donated $1.57 million himself. Chan was in Europe to promote ‘Kung Fu Panda’ at the Cannes Film Festival, for which he did the voice of Master Monkey. But he isn’t too concerned about Hollywood at the moment. He wants to help the people in China as soon as possible, starting by rebuilding the schools.

We all know Quentin Tarantino is working on his World War II movie ‘Inglorious Bastards,’ but nobody really knew when it was coming out. Now, the man himself wants it to be ready for Cannes 2009. “The next movie I’m doing is my World War II movie. I just finished up the first draft and if all goes well, I will be here, in Cannes, in 2009 with Inglorious Bastards!” The crowd went wild after that, leaving several people severely injured, I imagine.

But to be reasonable, he’s made a couple of remarks like this before. So I don’t think anybody is really expecting his new movie to be there at Cannes next year. In 2005 Tarantino said he had finished the script, but had to convert it to a ’shooting script.’

Not Clint Eastwood’s ‘Changeling,’ not Steven Soderbergh’s ‘Che.’ Not Charlie Kaufman’s ‘Synecdoche, New York’ and not even the rumored documentary ‘Waltz With Bashir’ went home with a Palme d’Or. It was the French picture ‘Entre les murs’ (’The Class’) that got the highest prize of the Cannes Film Festival. It’s a film about the high tension and energy in the classroom today, a hot topic in France.

“I think it would be good for all those people who claim to be able to judge youth … in two or three aphorisms to learn something new about youth,” the main actor of the movie said. Jury president Sean Penn called it “an amazing, amazing [...] virtually seamless film. All the performances, magic. All the writing, magic. It just touched us so deeply.“

As a consolation prize for Steven Soderbergh, Benicio del Toro was crowned Best Actor for leading in ‘Che.’ “I’d like to dedicate this to the man himself, Che Guevara,” he said. Clint Eastwood got his consolation prize in the form of a “special prize of the 61st Cannes Film Festival,” but he wasn’t at the ceremony to collect it.