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The World Cup final between defending champion Argentina and Spain not only marks the first final matchup between these two teams, but also the first halftime show in FIFA history. The match takes place on July 19 at 12 p.m. PT/3 p.m. ET, with the halftime show likely falling about 45 minutes or an hour into the game, between 12:45 and 1 p.m. PT. Broadcast live on Fox, the final and performance can be livestreamed on any service that carries said network, namely DirecTV (with a five-day free trial), Fubo, Sling and Hulu + Live TV.

The 2026 final, including its halftime show, will also stream live on Fox One, the official 2026 World Cup streamer. Following the service’s three-day free trial, a Fox One subscription costs $19.99 per month. For Spanish-language coverage, Peacock is the official World Cup streamer.

At a Glance: How to Watch 2026 FIFA World Cup Halftime Show

FIFA World Cup Halftime Show Performers 2026

The 11-minute performance, curated by Coldplay’s Chris Martin, will be co-headlined by Madonna, Shakira, BTS and Justin Bieber. The halftime show’s lineup also includes Burna Boy, Gustavo Dudamel and his orchestra, PS22 Chorus featuring Coldplay, plus ‘Sesame Street’ and ‘Muppets’ characters.

Where to Watch World Cup Final Halftime Show 2026: Stream Online Free

Since the FIFA World Cup final halftime show airs on Fox, it will also be available to watch live on any streaming service that carries the network, including DirecTV (with a five-day free trial), Fubo, Sling and Hulu + Live TV. It will also stream live on Fox One, the official World Cup streamer. Following Fox One’s three-day free trial, the service costs $19.99 per month. For Spanish-language coverage, stream on Peacock.

More on each option — and their new subscriber discounts — below.

Learn more about each plan option, including how to build your own channel lineup (starting at just $19.99 per month), at directv.com.

Related: The Best Peacock Subscription Deals and Free Trial Hacks

Anne Hathaway is sharing a status update on the long-awaited third installment in The Princess Diaries franchise.

The Oscar winner, who played Mia Thermopolis in the 2001 and 2004 films, made a recent appearance on SiriusXM’s Radio Andy, where she was asked by host Andy Cohen, “Where are we at on Princess Diaries 3?”

“I’m busy making baby No. 3 and that has sort of taken the place of knowing exactly when I can make Princess Diaries 3,” Hathaway said with a laugh. She announced last month that she’s pregnant with her third child with husband Adam Shulman.

“But I can say I think we had a story breakthrough. I think we are moving in the right direction. The script that we were working on — we kind of had to start over with this new direction, which is not the update I think anybody wants, but we all feel really good that this is gonna be the one,” The Odyssey star added.

The Hollywood Reporter first reported in 2022 that a script was in the works for a third installment. It was later revealed in 2024 that Adele Lim had been tapped to direct the feature.

While details are being kept under wraps, the film is set to be a continuation of the film series, which centers on Mia Thermopolis (Hathaway), who finds out that she is the heir apparent to the throne of Genovia. At the end of the second installment, Mia is crowned the queen of Genovia single after Parliament abolishes the law requiring that a queen be married first. However, she also finally gets together with Nicholas Devereaux (Chris Pine) after calling off her wedding to Andrew Jacoby (Callum Blue).

During a chat with THR last month, The Princess Diaries author Meg Cabot shared, “I’m so excited there is a third movie. I read a script, and it was amazing. I told them not to send anymore, because I love it so much. I have a problem keeping my mouth shut.”

She also teased, “I’m very happy with what I’ve read so far, but there’s definitely some book things that were involved in the last script I read.”

Freddy Cannon, the rock and roller whose hits include “Palisades Park” and “Tallahassee Lassie,” has died. He was 89.

Cannon died Friday at a hospice facility in California, his friend, iHeart Radio’s Tom Cuddy, announced. Cuddy said that Cannon was scheduled to interview with DJ Cousin Brucie Morrow on July 11, however he was taken to the hospital a day before the appearance.

The rocker, who was nicknamed Freddy “Boom Boom” Cannon, was born on Dec. 4, 1936, in Lynn, Massachusetts, where he started his music career. An early recording of the soon-to-be hit track “Tallahassee Lassie” intrigued Dick Clark. He and his wife, Jeanette, then moved moved to Philadelphia in his late teens, partly thanks to Clark who urged him to do so.

The track later came out in 1959, peaking at No. 6 on Billboard’s Hot 100; it became Cannon’s first song to grace the Billboard charts. One year later, he appeared on Clark’s American Bandstand for this first time. Cannon went on to appear on the weekly dance show a multitude of times over the years, with a record-setting 110 apperances.

“Palisades Park” was released in 1962, becoming his highest charing track (it landed at No. 3). Cannon’s additional hits included 1960’s “Jump Over” and “Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy,” 1964’s “Abigail Beecher,” 1965’s “Action” and 1966’s “The Dedication Song,” among many others.

Cannon released his memoir, Where the Action Is!, in 2011, which is a television series he also appeared in. His screen credits also included No Time for Sergeants, Village of the Giants, Never Too Young and Svengoolie.

He is survived by his children Conny Weber and Billy Cannon; his sister Mary Lou; son-in-law Jim; daughter-in-law Beth; five grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. Cannon was pre-deceased by his son John, who died in April, and his wife Jeanette, who died in 2024.

Paramount and Activision’s upcoming Call of Duty movie will be set in the Modern Warfare universe.

Director and co-writer Peter Berg announced the news Saturday during Fanatics Fest in New York City, confirming that the film will adapt the franchise’s most popular and recognizable subseries.

Taylor Sheridan, the creator of Landman, the Yellowstone universe, Lioness and more, is co-writing the screenplay for the studio alongside Berg, whose directing credits include Friday Night Lights, Battleship, Lone Survivor and Deepwater Horizon. Sheridan, Berg and David Glasser of 101 Studios are also producing.

During its CinemaCon presentation in April, it was revealed that the planned theatrical release date was slated for June 30, 2028. The release will coincide with the 25th anniversary of the Call of Duty franchise, which debuted in 2003.

“I told everyone we were only going to make a movie if it’s right. In David Ellison, we found that partnership,” Activision head Rob Kostich said at the time. “We want to make sure that the authenticity of it is captured on a human level so that it feels really real and infuse that with epic scope.”

Call of Duty is one of the best-selling video game franchises of all time, with more than 500 million copies sold worldwide. Past installments of the franchise have spanned wars from World War II to Vietnam to the present and future. The latest installment, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, is scheduled to launch on Oct. 23 and follows a war between North and South Korea.

Winners of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts’ 22nd BAFTA Student Awards include young filmmakers from Spain, France, China and the United States, it was revealed at a ceremony in Los Angeles on Friday night that was hosted by TV host Elle Osili Wood and featured presenters such as actor/producer Asif Ali, actor/writer Wil Wheaton, immersive artist Gina Kim and film executives Kathryn Busby and Niels Swinkels.

The BAFTA Student Awards celebrate emerging creative talent from around the world across film, games and immersive storytelling. This year’s winners were chosen from more than 600 submissions from universities worldwide by a jury that included actor/writer Joel Kim Booster, composer Laura Karpman, documentarian Smriti Mundhra, actor/comedian Nico Santos and exec Heather Callow.

“We continue to be inspired by the originality and ambition of student work from across the globe,” Courtney LaBarge Bell, BAFTA North America’s executive director, said in a statement. “Each year, these projects raise the bar for storytelling across film, games, and immersive media, and reflect the creative energy driving the future. We’re proud to provide a platform that recognizes this talent and helps support the next stage of their careers.”

Here is a list of the 2026 BAFTA Student Award winners…

THE ALBERT R. ‘CUBBY’ BROCCOLI SPECIAL JURY PRIZE

Rage
Fran Moreno Blanco, Santi Pujol Amat
Escola Superior de Cinema i Audiovisuals de Catalunya, Spain

FOR ANIMATION (PRESENTED BY CRUNCHYROLL)

Gauze
Noran Fikri Alezabi, Nicholas Arujah, Xinyue Ma, Yulin Yue, Xiaonan Zhou
Gobelins, France

FOR DOCUMENTARY (PRESENTED BY ESPN BOLD)

Strangers on Our Land
Zane Karram, Kelsey Oliver
University of California, Berkeley, United States

FOR LIVE ACTION

Whispers of the Waves
Patricia Xu
Beijing Film Academy, China

FOR GAMES

Candellum
Eva Martinello, Mattéo Gomez
Isart Digital, France

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Just ahead of the 2026 World Cup final between Spain and Argentina, France and England must go toe-to-toe to determine who will take third place. Broadcast live on Saturday, July 18 at 2 p.m. PT/5 p.m. ET on Fox, the match can be livestreamed on any streaming service that carries said network, namely DirecTV (with a five-day free trial), Fubo, Sling and Hulu + Live TV. And since the World Cup concludes with the July 19 final, DirecTV’s five-day trial will provide free coverage through the remainder of the tournament and beyond.

Like every match in this year’s tournament, the France vs. England matchup will also stream live on Fox One, the official 2026 World Cup streamer. Following the service’s three-day free trial, a Fox One subscription costs $19.99 per month. For Spanish-language coverage, Peacock is the official World Cup streamer.

At a Glance: How to Watch France vs. England World Cup Third-Place Playoff

Where to Watch France vs. England World Cup Match: Air Date, Time

The tournament’s third-place game will be broadcast live on Saturday, July 18 at 2 p.m. PT/5 p.m. ET on Fox. It will also air live on Telemundo in Spanish.

Where to Stream France vs. England World Cup Match Online Free

Since the FIFA World Cup bronze match airs on Fox, it will also be available to watch live on any streaming service that carries the network, including DirecTV (with a five-day free trial), Fubo, Sling and Hulu + Live TV. By opting for DirecTV’s five-day trial, fans can also tune in to the July 19 final at no cost.

All matches also stream live on Fox One, the official World Cup streamer. Following Fox One’s three-day free trial, the service costs $19.99 per month. For Spanish-language coverage, Peacock is the official World Cup streamer.

More on each option — and their new subscriber discounts — below.

Learn more about each plan option, including how to build your own channel lineup (starting at just $19.99 per month), at directv.com.

Related: The Best Peacock Subscription Deals and Free Trial Hacks

Christopher Nolan‘s box office journey with The Odyssey looks to be one for the books, as Universal Pictures‘ star-studded adaptation of the classical Greek mythological tale gets off to a rousing start in its opening weekend.

Starring Matt Damon as the heroic Odysseus, the epic feature is fending off competition with $51.2 million on Friday from 3,900 North American screens, including Thursday previews. Earning an A CinemaScore from audiences, the film is eyeing a $120 million-plus frame, which would make it 2026’s biggest live-action opening, with only Toy Story 5 ($159 million) and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie ($131 million) debuting above it. The Odyssey is also set to claim the top R-rated opening of the year and Universal’s highest weekend launch ever for an R-rated movie.

Globally, The Odyssey appears headed for $257.8 million for the summer weekend, with $137.3 million from 73 international markets.

This marks an even stronger start than initially projected for the film, which has a production budget of $250 million, as the studio was targeting a domestic opening in the mid-$80 million to $100 million range. Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Lupita Nyong’o, Zendaya and Charlize Theron star in the story of Odysseus (Damon) on his tumultuous trip home after the Trojan War to reclaim his throne as the king of Ithaca and reunite with his wife Penelope (Hathaway). Nolan and Emma Thomas produce for Syncopy.

With The Odyssey marking the first feature to be shot entirely on IMAX cameras, premium large formats have been a priority for many moviegoers, and cinephiles have flocked to the 25 U.S. theaters that screen IMAX 70mm film. The title is eyeing an estimated $30 million from IMAX screens domestically for 25 percent of its North American haul, with an additional $22 million expected from IMAX showings internationally.

This movie looks to notch the third-biggest opening weekend domestically of Nolan’s impressive career and the best outside of the Batman franchise, behind 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises with $160 million and 2008’s The Dark Knight at $158 million. The Odyssey is also set to become Nolan’s biggest global opening, topping The Dark Knight Rises’ $249 million worldwide launch.

The Odyssey is the weekend’s sole new offering in wide release, unlike the filmmaker’s most recent title, Oppenheimer, which opened in July 2023 alongside Barbie as part of the sensation known as Barbenheimer. The film about the physicist who led development of the atomic bomb opened to $82.4 million domestically and ultimately collected $975 million worldwide, and it won seven Academy Awards, including best picture and Nolan’s first best director Oscar. 

Nolan’s successful ride with The Odyssey includes sterling reviews, as its 95 percent approval rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes is currently the best tally of his career, just ahead of The Dark Knight and Memento at 94 percent. The Odyssey is also “verified hot,” with a 97 percent Rotten Tomatoes score from audiences. In his review for The Hollywood Reporter, chief film critic David Rooney deemed it “a meditative action movie both immense and intimate, albeit one whose flow is impeded by the inherently episodic nature of the nonlinear source material and some questionable casting choices.” Additionally, THR’s list ranking Nolan’s movies places The Odyssey in second place, behind only The Dark Knight.

The sophomore frame for Disney’s live-action Moana is set to dock in second place. After a disappointing opening, the Dwayne Johnson-led feature is heading to roughly $19 million domestically for the weekend, declining around 56 percent for a two-week run of $82 million in North America.

Illumination’s Minions & Monsters and Disney’s Toy Story 5 are in close competition for No. 3 on the chart. As the latest title in Universal’s Despicable Me franchise, Minions & Monsters looks to pick up $4.2 million Friday for a third weekend of $14 million, bringing its domestic haul to $136 million. Meanwhile, the latest installment in the popular Toy Story series is also lassoing roughly $4.2 million Friday for around $13.8 million in its fifth frame for a domestic sum of $429 million.

Closing out the top five is Warner Bros.’ Evil Dead Burn, the latest entry in the Evil Dead horror franchise. After its opening sum last weekend was well behind the debut of 2023’s Evil Dead Rise, Evil Dead Burn is expected to gross around $4.7 million this weekend, declining 66 percent for a two-week domestic total at $23.8 million.

Sunday’s World Cup final between Spain and Argentina presents potential competition for moviegoing, particularly among international audiences. In a rare summer occurrence, next weekend is devoid of new wide releases, as studios appear reticent to date any titles between The Odyssey and Sony’s July 31 release of Spider-Man: Brand New Day, starring Holland and Zendaya.

If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, The Hollywood Reporter may receive an affiliate commission.

A great handbag can instantly elevate any wardrobe, but finding a designer style on sale is a rare opportunity. Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale is giving shoppers the chance to save on luxury handbags, with limited-time discounts on coveted styles that rarely receive markdowns throughout the year.

The annual shopping event is back with some of the retailer’s biggest savings across fashion, beauty and accessories. Early access for Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale began Tuesday, July 14, while the sale opens to all shoppers on Saturday, July 18 and runs through Sunday, Aug. 9.

This year, the sale features some of its steepest discounts yet on sought-after designer handbags from luxury labels like Tory Burch, Marc Jacobs, Coach and Tory Burch. With select styles marked down by more than $500 and many luxury bags reaching nearly $1,500 off in total, shoppers have a rare opportunity to add coveted pieces to their collections before the best deals sell out.

Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale 2026 Dates

Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale opens to the public on Saturday, July 18 and ends Sunday, Aug. 9. Since designer handbags are among the most popular categories during the annual savings event, shopping early is a major advantage for those looking to secure their favorite styles.

Why Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale Is the Best Time to Buy a Designer Handbag

A designer handbag is more than just an accessory — it’s a wardrobe investment, which makes finding one on sale even more exciting. Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale offers a rare chance to save on current-season styles and elevated designs that don’t typically receive major discounts.

Whether you’ve been eyeing an everyday crossbody, a polished work tote or a statement handbag, the annual sale brings together some of the most sought-after styles at a lower price point. For anyone looking to add a luxury accessory to their collection, it’s one shopping event worth watching before prices go back to normal on Aug.10.

Nordstrom Anniversary Sale 2026: Best Designer Handbag Deals

On May 1, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced a major change to the eligibility rules for the best international feature film. No longer would a film have to be nominated by the country of origin; henceforth, it could land in the pool of nominees by winning an award from a list of high-profile international film festivals. Moreover, in recognition of the fact that a person not a nation actually directs the film, the director’s name and not the country’s will be engraved for posterity on the statuette plaque.

The new protocols for the best international film category, née best foreign language film, are the latest rejiggering in what has historically been one of the more contentious and confusing Oscar categories.  Of course, under whatever rules, Oscar validation can mean the difference between multi-platform distribution and oblivion in the American marketplace.   

So, despite the provincialism of allotting a mere five slots to the output of the rest of the planet, foreign filmmakers have been eager to perform due obeisance before the Academy, which since 1957 has granted offshore films a regular seat at the festivities. (The first winner was Federico Fellini’s La Strada.)  Before that, the Academy doled out an Honorary Oscar when the impact and excellence of a foreign film became too conspicuous to ignore, as with Italy’s The Bicycle Thief in 1949 or Japan’s Rashomon in 1952. The honor was voted on by the Board of Governors, to save the full Academy membership from reading subtitles. (Today the nominees are chosen by an Academy-approved Select Committee). Costa-Gavras’s Z (1969), nominated for best picture and best foreign language Film (it won the latter), was a landmark border crossing and, in 2020, Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite broke the language barrier by becoming the first non-English language film to win best picture.

However, of all the foreign-born incursions into top-tier Oscar territory, the first breakthrough is the most curious. At a time when subtitled films were a species of exotica, and with no major studio backing, Jean Renoir’s antiwar classic La Grande Illusion (1937) — easily translated as Grand Illusion — landed a nomination in the best picture slot, which was then called outstanding production and included ten candidates. (The other nominees were Boys Town, The Citadel, Pygmalion, Test Pilot [all MGM],  Four Daughters, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Jezebel [Warner Bros.], Alexander’s Ragtime Band [20th Century-Fox]  and You Can’t Take It with You [Columbia]. The last, directed by Frank Capra, won.) To be sure, in 1949 a British invader, Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet, won best picture, but it was at least in English and credited to an A-list screenwriter. But how did Grand Illusion manage to crash the exclusive party?

In 1938, Jean Renoir was not a known name in the US, much less a world-famous auteur.  It seems unbelievable that two of his early masterpieces — Boudu Saved from Drowning (1932) and The Crime of Monsieur Lange (1936) were not released in the US until 1967 and 1964 respectively. Renoir’s version of Maxim Gorky’s The Lower Depths (1936) and his Popular Front documentary The People of France (1936) got only modest arthouse circulation and critical attention, with reviewers sure to identify the director as “the son of the famous French impressionist Auguste Renoir.” Only after Grand Illusion was Renoir acknowledged in his own right as a French master in another medium.

Made in Paris by Les Realisation d’Art Cinematographyque, Grand Illusion was distributed stateside by World Pictures Corp., operated by the legendary foreign film magnate Irvin Shapiro, who began his career importing The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) and capped it by exporting The Evil Dead (1985).  Like almost all films about the Great War made in its aftermath but before its sequel, it is somber in tone and pacificist in sentiment. There are no scenes of thrilling aerial combat or over-the-top attacks in no man’s land. “A War Story without War Scenes!” warned the advertising. Renoir knew the material first hand, having served as both a cavalry officer and a pilot in the Great War and been wounded twice. 

Two French pilots — Captain de Boeldieu (Pierre Fresnay), a white-gloved aristocrat, and Lieutenant Maréchal (Jean Gabin), a gruff former machinist — are shot down over German lines by the ramrod-straight Prussian aviator Captain von Rauffenstein (Erich von Stroheim). A chivalric knight of the air, von Rauffenstein plays the gracious host to his prisoner-guests before they must depart for a prison camp. The accommodations in the German POW camp are not half bad and the company is great. De Boeldieu and Marechal encounter a diverse crew of colorful countrymen — a comedian, a literary scholar, and the son of a wealthy Jewish family, Lieutenant Rosenthal (Marcel Dalio), a stalwart solider who generously shares his bountiful food parcels.  (The affirmative portrait of Rosenthal was certainly by way of apology for the treatment of the most famous Jew in French military history, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, who had just died in 1935.)

Of course, the prisoners are digging a tunnel to escape. “A golf course is for golf, a tennis court for tennis, a prison camp for escape,” observes de Boeldieu. When not excavating and eating Rosenthal’s bread and cheese, the men rehearse for a musical comedy performance featuring a chorus line of men in drag. The shenanigans are interrupted by news that the French have retaken Fort Douaumont, marking the end of the carnage at Verdun. In an outburst of patriotism, the prisoners rise to sing “La Marseillaise,” a scene that ranks as the second most stirring rendition of the French National anthem in motion picture history.   

As recidivist would-be escapees, de Boeldieu, Marechal, and Rosenthal are transferred to an impregnable medieval fortress, commanded by Captain von Rauffenstein, now burnt, broken in body, and wearing a neck brace. Knowing their days of bloodline privilege are numbered, the German and the French aristocrat bond, their class affinities binding them more tightly than the uniforms that separate them. Renoir told film historian Arthur Knight that if a French farmer and a French financier dined together, they would sit in uncomfortable silence, but if a French farmer and a Chinese farmer dined together, they would find plenty to talk about.

Still, a French prisoner must do his duty: de Boeldieu gallantly stages a diversion so Maréchal and Rosenthal can escape, during which a reluctant von Rauffenstein is forced to shoot his class comrade. On his death bed, de Boeldieu accepts the fortunes of war as Von Ruffenstein grieves.  

The third act finds Maréchal and Rosenthal scurrying through the woods and fields, squabbling and miserable, until they come upon a farmhouse run by a fetching German war widow (Dita Parlo) with an adorable daughter. She takes them in, gives them shelter and food, and falls hard for Marechal, 1937 being the year of peak Jean Gabin. In too short a time, though, the pair must leave the idyll. Against odds, they escape into Switzerland. The guards on the German side see no point in firing as, in the distance, the men plod through the snow to freedom. In Great War territory, this counts as a happy ending.

On June 8, 1937, La Grande Illusion premiered at the 1250-seat Marivaux Theater in Paris, to a packed house made up of “members of Paris society, Paris cinema and theater circles, writers and press representatives” who, at the end, “gave long and loud applause.” The French critics, then as now a surly and hard-to-please lot, were unanimous in praise: “an important and extremely happy event in French cinema history” (Le Temps); “a masterpiece of cinema”; (Mariane); and “a very fine film, a beautiful human work” (Oeuvre). In the theater that night was Pierre Autre, Motion Picture Herald’s man in Paris, who first sent word back to American readers, a rave that has stood the test of time. “La Grande Illusion is, by far, the best French film of the year, up to date — in fact, it is one of the best French films ever made.” The Hollywood Reporter also predicted that “the smash hit” should “go well in the States.”

It did better than well. In America, Grand Illusion became the most widely circulated and highly praised foreign film of the 1930s.

On Sept. 12, 1938, Grand Illusion opened at the newly refurbished Filmarte Theater in New York with columnist Dorothy Thompson, novelist Fannie Hurst, playwright Clifford Odets, and actress Aline MacMahon in attendance. The Filmarte was run by a pioneering importer of foreign film, Jean H. Lenauer, whose arthouse was emblematic of what were called “sure seaters” in the trade because a small but devoted clientele was sure to buy a ticket to whatever foreign film happened to be booked. Grand Illusion played the Filmarte for a record-breaking 27 weeks. The lobby was decorated with reproductions of Impressionist paintings by Auguste Renoir.

Meanwhile, the word on Grand Illusion was getting out beyond the insular arthouse crowd. Samuel Goldwyn called it “the most brilliantly directed film I have seen in years — a challenge to Hollywood.” Producer Walter Wanger, director Mervyn LeRoy, and the actresses Lillian Gish and Helen Hayes also offered endorsements. The New York Film Critics named Grand Illusion the year’s best foreign film. The National Board of Review dispensed with qualifiers and named it “the best film of the year from any country.”  The Film Daily ran out of superlatives and finally just said, “you owe it to yourself to see this picture — it will send you out thinking.”

Some of the best notices went to von Stroheim, basically radioactive in Hollywood since Joseph P. Kennedy booted him off the set of Queen Kelly in 1929.  In The New York Times, Frank Nugent chided Hollywood for its “folly in permitting so fine an actor to remain idle and unwanted.” Von Stroheim responded in character. “You can’t expect a director to enjoy acting when directing is the nearest thing to being God,” he said. “I have enjoyed acting in pictures directed by a director called Eric von Stroheim, and written by a writer called Eric von Stroheim.”

To break out of the arthouse ghetto, however, Grand Illusion needed a transit visa into the mainstream exhibition market, namely a Production Code seal. On July 29, 1938,  Irvin Shapiro duly applied for the imprimatur from Hollywood’s censorship regime. Unsurprisingly, the Code guardians asked for a few “slight deletions” — a shot of a prisoner rubbing a pair of silk underwear, the use of the word “damn,” and a reference to a prisoner who tries to escape dressed as a woman (“Quite amusing,” comments a friend. ”Not so amusing when a sergeant mistook me for one,” he replies.).  Also concerning was “the racial angle in reference to Rosenthal” — that is, an antisemitic insult aimed at him once in anger, once in jest, by Maréchal. But this was a matter left “solely for [Shapiro] to decide.”  Shapiro decided to keep the insults. On Nov. 23, 1938, after the requested cuts were made, the PCA issued Grand Illusion a Code seal. The Roman Catholic Legion of Decency also gave it clean bill of health, rating it “AI: unobjectionable for adults.”

With the Code imprimatur, Grand Illusion spread out beyond the arthouses and played the RKO, Warner, and Publix circuits. Reviews and ads were careful to explain to the first-time foreign filmgoers that “English titles translate the dialogue.” The box office thrived on word of mouth, repeat business, and high school French teachers dragging their classes to screenings.

Grand Illusion was also fortunate to hit the crest of an antiwar zeitgeist.  Another great war, with less chivalric Germans, was looming on the horizon: in March 1938, the Nazis annexed Austria; October saw the invasion of the Sudetenland, and on Nov. 9-10 the Reich-wide pogrom now known as Kristallnacht was launched.  For many Americans, a film about what Variety called “the futility of mankind’s armed conflict” had ominous relevance. 

Not that the antiwar message was universally embraced. Though Grand Illusion  won “the most artistic ensemble” award at the Venice Film Festival in 1937, it was banned by the Italians under pressure from Nazi Germany on the grounds that the film “has an anti-German tendency and offends Germany’s honor.” Actually, what offended the Nazis was the sympathetic portrayal of Rosenthal. The Nazis also took more active measures to suppress the film. In 1938, film historian Herman G. Weinberg reported that on the very day that the Nazis moved in to Vienna [March 13, 1938], “Grand Illusion was taken off the screen in the middle of a reel by the storm troopers.” Renoir regarded the shut-down “as a signal honor — and a decoration.”

In America, the reception of Grand Illusion was less violent but still passionate: isolationists and anti-Nazis alike adopted the film for their cause. On Jan. 12, 1939, a special “Congressional Night” screening of Grand Illusion at the Belasco Theater in Washington, DC was arranged for senators and congressmen because, said the management, “the picture’s indictment of warfare will be a message of interest to not only the Committees of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Relations, but to legislators generally.” The ardent isolationist Congressman Hamilton Fish (R-NY) blurbed the film as “an antidote to war hysteria.” From the other side of the ideological spectrum, anti-Nazis interpreted the tolerant and pacifist spirit of the film as a rebuke to Nazi eugenics and militarism. “It will give you hope for humanity and patience and inspiration in the fight against the Nazi syphilis,” said Mike Gold in the Daily Worker. In Los Angeles, the Hollywood Anti-Nazi League sponsored screenings of Grand Illusion.

Ultimately, the critical buzz and cultural impact of Grand Illusion reached into the ranks of the Academy voting pool. The timing was fortuitous. In accord with newly agreed to protocols adopted by the Academy Rules Committee on Dec. 20, 1937, selection of the nominees for Outstanding Production was now open to all eligible voters (whereas only directors selected the best director nominees and actors the Best Actor and Actress nominees and so on).

On Jan. 23, 1939, the nomination ballots were sent out to 4,000 Academy members; they had to be returned by February 3. By then Grand Illusion had been playing in New York since its premiere in July and in Los Angeles since November 1938. When the voting went down, every savvy person in the motion picture industry had certainly seen it. Its resonant timeliness and manifest excellence (everyone knew it was a work of genius on sight) catapulted Grand Illusion into the top ten. For Jean Renoir and Irvin Shapiro, the cliché was true: it was an honor just to be nominated.  

The recognition from the Academy kept Grand Illusion circulating. In New York, after ending its run at the Filmarte, it moved over to the 68th Street Playhouse, another landmark arthouse.

In September 1939, upon the outbreak of the war in Europe, World Pictures Corp. re-released Grand Illusion with a new publicity campaign tailored to the moment. “Never so timely!”  exclaimed the ads. “They said the Europe of 1914-1918 would never happen again—but!” Renoir’s response — you can picture him giving a resigned Gallic shrug — was laconic. “In 1936, I made a picture in which I tried to express all my deep feelings for the cause of peace. It was very successful. Three years later the war broke out.”

By then, von Stroheim had offered his services to the French army, which thanked him politely but declined. Back in Hollywood, he played sinister Nazis in Five Graves to Cairo (1943) and The North Star (1944). In 1941, Renoir also came to Hollywood. Darryl F. Zanuck, a great admirer of Grand Illusion, signed him to a deal at 20th Century-Fox, but after an unhappy experience with the Tobacco Road-ish Swamp Water (1942), Renoir moved to RKO for This Land Is Mine (1943), about French resistance under the Nazi occupation, and United Artists for The Southerner (1945), a social realist drama about sharecroppers that was a genuine hit. After The Woman on the Beach (RKO, 1947), a moody noir with Joan Bennett as the woman, he returned to Europe for a postwar blossoming in Technicolor that included The Golden Couch (1952), which exposed Americans to the Commedia dell Arte, and French Can Can (1955), set during the Belle Epoque. He later made his home in Los Angeles, where he died in 1979, still tormented by a leg wound from the Great War.

The story of Grand Illusion has a coda that Captain de Boeldieu and Captain Von Ruffenstein might have appreciated. 

In June 1940, when the Nazis barreled in to Paris, Henri Langlois, the archivist-programmer of the Cinematheque Francaise, was desperate to protect his collection of French cinema — including the original 35mm negative of Grand Illusion which Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels ordered seized and destroyed.  Before the war, however, at the first meeting of the International Federation of Film Archives, held at the Museum of Modern Art in 1939, Langlois had made friends with Franz Hensel, head archivist for the Reichsfilmkammer, the motion picture branch of Goebbels’s propaganda ministry.  
Hensel was now a Nazi major stationed in Paris during the Occupation. Going seriously rogue, he collaborated with Langlois to safeguard the treasures of the Cinémathèque Française, which Langlois had hidden in the basement of the Palais de Chaillot Hotel. Described by The Hollywood Reporter as “a Nazi who apparently cared more for cinema than party allegiance,” Hensel rescued the negative of Grand Illusion despite the film being deemed “cinematic public enemy No. 1” by Goebbels. When the Nazis confiscated the negative and shipped it back to Berlin, Hensel safeguarded it in the Reichsfilmarchiv vaults in Berlin until the Allied victory.

Berlin was in the Soviet sector. In 1945, according to an account by Stuart Klawans in The Nation, the Russians transported the negative back to Moscow and deposited it at Gosfilmofund, the Soviet film archive, unaware of its value. Eventually, Soviet and French film archivists realized what they had. In 1999, a clean print of Grand Illusion was struck from the original negative and released by Rialto Pictures. This is the definitive version currently in circulation.

It probably never happened but I like to think it is just possible that in 1939 Langlois and Hensel cut out from the film conference at MoMA and wandered up to the 68th Street Playhouse to catch a screening of Grand Illusion.   

***
Author’s note: I want to thank the indispensable Louise Hilton, archivist at the Margaret Herrick Library, for facilitating access to the Production Code files on Grand Illusion. 

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