Hereafter the Palm? The Sweet Hereafter crew, on their way into the film's gala screening.

CAPTION: Canadian director Atom Egoyan, right, poses with Canadian actors Sarah Polley and Bruce Greenwood starring in Egoyan's movie The Sweet Hereafter in competition for the Cannes Film Festival Thursday.	Ph: Patrick Hertzog/Daily Variety 5/16/97 Lauded at Cannes: The Sweet Hereafter stars Bruce Greenwood and Sarah Polley with co-star Caerthan Banks, daughter of book author Russell Banks

Two shots of the cast with Atom in Cannes

IT'S NOT EASY BEING GREENWOOD: The Sweet Hereafter star Bruce Greenwood was unrecognizable at Alliance's shindig. But the handsome Canadian actor, who plays a dressed-down hick in the film, is apparently known for his movie star good looks in these posh parts. In Cannes a couple of years ago for Atom Egoyan's Exotica, he was constantly stopped and snapped by a throng of paparazzi while cruising the Croisette. "Then one of them asked for an autograph, and I said, yeah, sure!" recalled Greenwood, "and he whips out this 8"x10" glossy of -- Dennis Quaid!" Greenwood, naturally, protested, but it must have lost something in the translation. "So I signed it," he laughed. "What was I to do, spoil his day?" In Egoyan's The Sweet Hereafter, Greenwood worked hard to look un-Quaid-like, dismantling a capped tooth to attain that hillbilly gap thing. "That rumor Atom is spreading around that I lost it in a barroom brawl isn't really true," he confided in a whisper, "but the real story is so much less dramatic."

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Robert Lantos of Alliance, stars Bruce Greenwood and Sarah Polley, producer Camelia Frieberg, Atom Egoyan, author Russell Banks and his daughter Caerthan, who had a part in the film		a closer look at Bruce and Sarah Polley

CANNES -- Longtime indie maverick Atom Egoyan is back in Cannes with The Sweet Hereafter and these were the whispers at Thursday's press confab: The moons may be aligned for helmer Ehoyan to walk off with the Palme.

Egoyan, a Cannes veteran who wooed European cineastes two years back with the quirky Exotica, was joined on a Palais dais by "Sweet" producers Robert Lantos and Camilia Frieberg, stars Sarah Polley and Bruce Greenwood, and Russell Banks, the novelist whose dark tome about a community shattered by the deaths of some of its children was the springboard for Egoyan's official selection entrant.

"I wanted to examine lives that, because of a terrible accident, were heightened to the level of mythology," Egoyan told the press, many of whom had just seen Egoyan's film and were clearly shaken by its subject matter. What resulted was a press gathering most notable for its rumination on death and the metaphysical. "In grief we often want to blame someone," Egoyan said of "Sweet's" subject matter. "We think it helps us find an answer. But what happens in 'Sweet' is that in this quest for blame, we deal with other questions that pertain to the basic truth of who we are."

Egoyan, who speaks fluent French, was said by many at the confab to have been "robbed" when his 1995 Cannes entrant, Exotica, failed to win a top prize. He is also going to assist festival fave Michelangelo Antonioni in the latter's next film. Thus, many at the conference openly wondered if Egoyan may be the "politically correct" candidate for this year's Palme.

Personal Appearances The Sweet Hereafter Atom Egoyan