A Hollywood princess returns to the screen

In the spring of 1955, Grace Kelly sprinkled a bit of stardust around the eighth international film festival in Cannes, then headed up the coast to Monaco, where she met, and eventually married, the principality’s reigning monarch, Rainier III.

At least in memory, Princess Grace will now return to Cannes on Wednesday evening, with the opening-night gala premiere of a biographical film, “Grace of Monaco.” But the road back hasn’t been smooth.

The festival is no stranger to turmoil. As recently as 2011, the director Lars von Trier was thrown out for joking about Nazi sympathies. But the event has rarely, if ever, opened with a movie that was so badly jolted by disputes over its content, its planned release and even the decision to screen it in a seemingly perfect setting, where the fairy tale began of an American actress who became a princess.

“We love Cannes, it was something like a gift,” said Pierre-Ange Le Pogam, a producer of the film, of its selection.

Mr. Le Pogam spoke last week by telephone of his aim to transcend discord around the picture, which was directed by Olivier Dahan (known for “La Vie en Rose,” about Edith Piaf) and stars Nicole Kidman in a look-alike performance as Princess Grace, alongside Tim Roth, as Prince Rainier. Still, tensions boiled over in late January exactly as the Cannes festival and its director, Thierry Frémaux, announced its selection for a first-night showing.

In short order, Harvey Weinstein, whose Weinstein Company had expected to release the film in the United States in March, with a world premiere of its own, cried foul over the opening plans.

Nobody had told Mr. Weinstein about the plan for the premiere in Cannes, according to people briefed on his dealings, who spoke on condition of anonymity because plans for the film were still in flux. And the evening before the festival announcement, he had rejected the delivery of what he regarded as an incomplete version of a film that struck him and fellow executives as being too much like a Hitchcock thriller and too little like what they anticipated — a yarn about a princess in a gilded cage.

An agreement on how the rollout will work is still being sorted out.

Weinstein, which bought rights to “Grace of Monaco” after the Berlin film festival last year, had already once bumped the movie out of its fall schedule, as Mr. Weinstein proposed a revised version. In a public interview, Mr. Dahan excoriated the Weinstein cut in profane terms, while accusing Mr. Weinstein of “blackmail.”

Mr. Pogam acknowledges that Mr. Weinstein probably did not know of the Cannes submission. But the disputes, he said, actually reflected deeper differences in American and European points of view toward film.

“You are Hollywood, you are the dreamers, this is why we love you,” Mr. Pogam said. “We are sometimes said to be arrogant, and serious, though I don’t think we are,” he added.

While Mr. Weinstein rumbled last month about abandoning the film over what he saw as a breach of contractual obligations, Gaumont and other European distributors proceeded with plans to open the movie abroad on the heels of Cannes.

Mr. Weinstein isn’t the only one who has raised objections over the film. Monaco’s ruling Grimaldi family has publicly criticized “Grace of Monaco” as a “farce.”

Citing the script and trailer, the Grimaldis, in an unusually blunt statement, said: “The princely family does not in any way wish to be associated with this film which reflects no reality and regrets that its history has been misappropriated for purely commercial purposes.”

Speaking last week, Mr. Pogam said he had been entirely willing to screen “Grace of Monaco” for the son and daughters of Princess Grace, who died following a car crash in 1982 (while Prince Rainier died 23 years later). “We’ve always been trying to show it,” he said, though no family screening was ever set.

While the princely heirs now appear unlikely to soften their stance, Mr. Weinstein last week put aside at least some of his objections. That happened mostly, said the people briefed on his plans, out of regard for the powerful Creative Artists Agency, which brokered the rights agreements, and for Ms. Kidman, with whom the Weinstein company is involved via its recently released “The Railway Man,” and a forthcoming film, “Paddington.”

But there has also been discussion of a sharp reduction in the $5 million Weinstein had initially agreed to pay for rights to “Grace of Monaco.” For roughly half that amount, the company is now likely to release Mr. Dahan’s film — which, executives say, incorporates some of Mr. Weinstein’s earlier editorial suggestions — probably in August or September. How widely the film will be shown, and whether it has the sizzle of an awards-worthy release, however, will depend, in part, on its reception at Cannes.

Was the movie damaged by the tiff, which triggered a flurry of reports, including an extensive account in The Los Angeles Times?

“Not a bit, not a bit,” said David Glasser, Weinstein’s president, who responded in Mr. Weinstein’s behalf to some questions about the film. After all, controversy of one sort or another has simply brought more attention to many Weinstein films, including “Lee Daniels’ The Butler,” which took in $117 million at the United States box office last year, after a sharp dispute between Weinstein and Warner Bros. over rights to its title.

Most of the bumps will be smoothed over at Cannes.

Gaumont, said Mr. Le Pogam, is planning a Wednesday night bash — designed to match the mood and stylings of the 1960s — near the Croisette.

Ms. Kidman and Mr. Roth are both expected. Ms. Kidman, who is flying in from Australia, where she has been working on a thriller called “Strangerland,” is expected to stick around for several days, doing interviews and getting her film back on track.

Mr. Weinstein and associates will also join the party.

“We’ll be there in full support,” Mr. Glasser said. “A good film is a good film.”

And if the Grimaldis care to drop down from Monaco, which is, after all, just up the coast, would they still be welcome?

“Of course,” Mr. Le Pogam said. “Of course!”