Showbiz: Moore in the running

Critics have ranked Michael Moore as one of the favourites to land the top prize at the Cannes film Festival, after his blistering anti-Bush documentary won a standing ovation.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is now firmly in line to be the first documentary to land the Palme d'Or since Jacques Cousteau and Louis Malle's marine epic The Silent World in 1956.

How does that go again?

Tom Hanks made a slip of the tongue during his Cannes Film Festival appearance to promote the Coen brothers' movie The Ladykillers.

Hanks said he admired the Coens' unpredictability and skewed sensibility. "But they also are incomprehensible - uh, uncompromising," he said, correcting himself.

Then he quipped: "Sometimes, let's face it, I've got some questions about Barton Fink, and [the Coens] can't even answer them."

The Ladykillers, in which Hanks plays a verbose gentleman-criminal, is competing for the top prize in Cannes, and Hanks' appearance was one of the most-awaited events.

But the star, who has earned two Oscars and grossed close to US$3 billion ($5.09 billion) at the box office in a career spanning almost 25 years, rates his performances a paltry C.

"I would give myself a 'C' in every movie I've ever been in. I'm the least objective human being to look at my own work," he said.

Give me a cat any time

Bad news for Justin Timberlake - girlfriend Cameron Diaz has few plans for the pair to set up a love nest together. The Charlie's Angels star said in an interview that she loves living alone.

"I don't think I could live with anybody," she said. Diaz, who gives voice to Princess Fiona in Shrek 2, told the New York Daily News: "I also love being by myself. I hang out with my cats. My fantasy is to spend a month without any communication with anyone. I make time for myself. That's a major part for me in balancing my life."

Diaz, 31, can command US$20 million ($33 million) a movie, but says her life is far from extravagant.

"Yes, money brings me stability and a sense of security. It's awesome. But I know how little of the money I make I actually spend. My wealth is the people I'm surrounded by and it's nobody's business how much money I make. It's so intrusive and rude. Who cares?"

'Potter' sends you potty

Mexican moviemaker Alfonso Cuaron is so relieved to see the back of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He has spent the past two years directing the latest Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, due out next month.

Cuaron took over as director from American Christopher Columbus, who made the first two Potter movies.

Asked if he was pleased that filming was now over, Cuaron replied with feeling, "Oh, yeah. It's a long process. It was a pleasure every single instant. I was never stressed but I was completely exhausted." And when you are working on one of the most famous film franchises in the world, there is no escaping the teenage wizard created by author J.K. Rowling. He is everywhere.

"There is another thing about Harry Potter. You cannot rest."

Guitarist heads for the radio

Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood will become the BBC's new composer in residence and will write a new work for one of its radio stations.

The assignment will allow Greenwood to use the BBC's musical resources, including the BBC Concert Orchestra. His manager, Bryce Edge, said the appointment would allow him to "learn how an orchestra works". The guitarist is a trained viola player but has not been educated in classical composition.

Stoned Stone murdered

A new film is to claim that Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones was murdered. Jones' body was found floating in the swimming pool of his Sussex mansion in 1969.

Drink and drugs were found in his bloodstream and an inquest recorded a verdict of misadventure.

But a British film, The Wild and Wycked World of Brian Jones, will claim the then 27-year-old was murdered by Frank Thorogood, a builder working on the star's home.

Thorogood reportedly confessed to the murder on his deathbed in 1993, saying, "It was me that did Brian. I just finally snapped."

Film-maker Stephen Woolley, who has explored real-life events before in Scandal, about the Profumo affair, and Backbeat, about the early days of the Beatles, has spent 10 years researching the project.

Jones' Swedish girlfriend, Anna Wohlin, always maintained Thorogood was cheating the star out of money over renovation work on his home and that an argument led to the murder.

He's no Casanova

Don't be fooled by Lenny Kravitz's bedroom eyes, his hip-hugging pants and the piercing in his pubic area. He doesn't always live up to his Casanova image. For example, the New York retro rocker, who turns 40 on May 26, did not cheat on Nicole Kidman.

"That was never the fact. It was made up," insists Kravitz.

His relationship with Kidman ended last winter because, it was speculated, he had dated other women. Now, on the eve of the release of Baptism, the four-time Grammy winner's seventh album of original songs, he wants to set the record straight.

"Certain things I can take, I have taken them for years," he says. "But these are just bare-faced lies. I try to take the high road, like, okay, I let it go. But after a while you have to stand up for yourself. It makes me look bad and it never happened."

- AGENCIES