Andy Garcia’s film “Diamond” opened Cannes with a film-noir setup—and a Waymo punchline that landed in dead silence, before the premiere pivoted into a broader, affectionate send-up of the genre.
You had to feel bad for Andy Garcia right at the beginning of the screening of his film “Diamond” at the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday night.
The movie starts the way classic film noir is supposed to: grainy black-and-white images of Angels Flight. Chinatown. the Bradbury Building. and other Los Angeles landmarks. A tonearm drops on an old-fashioned record player, and moody jazz fills a darkened room. Then a man—mostly seen in shadow—irons a pocket handkerchief. selects his wardrobe from a closet full of white shirts and dark suits. grabs a handful of business cards that read “Joe Diamond. Private Investigator. ” puts on a fedora. and heads out from an old brick building in downtown Los Angeles.
For a beat, the setting holds. Then the downtown LA punchline hits: he’s almost run over by a Waymo, the white self-driving cars that have taken over the rideshare business lately.
In a Los Angeles screening, that visual joke would likely have gotten big laughs. In the Grand Theatre Lumiere on the Croisette in the South of France, it was met with dead silence.
Either the French take their noir very, very seriously, or they haven’t seen Waymos yet. Or both. Either way. it was an inauspicious beginning for Garcia’s film—one that puts a comic spin on a beloved genre while leaning on the audience to share its sense of humor. its heart. and its familiarity with the noir trappings it’s saluting and sending up.
“Diamond” wasn’t alone in the Cannes spotlight on Tuesday night. It was the second big premiere in the last few days for a director better known as an actor. with Garcia facing a quick turnaround after John Travolta’s “Propeller One-Way Night Coach. ” which premiered on Friday. In this faceoff. Garcia comes out as the winner: “Diamond” was built from a literature class project Garcia’s daughter did in high school 20 years ago.
That long runway doesn’t erase the film’s low-budget, quick-shoot reality—at times it betrays its amateur beginnings with clunky plotting—but it is far more ambitious and more assured than Travolta’s “Propeller One-Way Night Coach,” a film treatment of a children’s book Travolta wrote in 1997.
Garcia also assembled a formidable cast for his noir experiment. He plays Joe Diamond. a private investigator who appears stuck in the 1940s and seems oblivious to the fact that he’s a hit on TikTok. Vicky Krieps is Sharon Cobb. a woman who hires Joe to figure out who killed her husband. a death for which she is being accused. Bill Murray appears as Jimbo, a bartender and part-time lawyer at a downtown joint. Rosemarie DeWitt is Angel, a flirtatious regular at the same place. Dustin Hoffman is Dr. Harry Kleinman, a coroner who just loves bending the rules for Joe. Brenda Fraser is “Danny Boy” McVicar. a character who might be a bad cop but also wants to be Joe’s friend. Demian Bichir, Danny Huston, LaTanya Richardson, Robert Patrick and others round out the supporting cast.
The film leans hard into Los Angeles as well. using locations including the Bradbury Building and the now-closed Cole’s restaurant. Between the ensemble and the city’s recognizable texture. it’s easy to feel the movie’s desire to be stylish. persuasive. and fun. Still. there are moments where it leaves viewers wanting more of Joe’s narration to land harder and more hard-boiled. and more of his detecting to look impressive while it’s happening.
Hoffman’s performance stands out for gleeful scenery-chewing. and DeWitt’s work is especially notable for packing the most humanity into the role of Angel. That warmth becomes even clearer in the film’s homestretch. when “Diamond” drops a surprise that grounds what has come before in genuine emotion and helps explain why Joe Diamond has often seemed to be playacting as a great detective rather than actually being one.
Joe keeps pushing forward, and so does Garcia. The film brings its story to an agreeable conclusion, then extends it just enough to chase down and tie every loose end it can find.
Screening out of competition. “Diamond” isn’t positioned to become one of this year’s Cannes standouts in terms of sheer accomplishment or substance. But there’s nothing wrong with giving the usual film-noir recipe a shot of heart and humor—and. for all the dead silence at the start. the premiere ultimately points that way.
Andy Garcia Diamond Cannes Film Festival film noir Waymo Joe Diamond Vicky Krieps Bill Murray Rosemarie DeWitt Dustin Hoffman Brenda Fraser TikTok Grand Theatre Lumiere Croisette