On Sunday, the red carpet procedures at the premiere of Michael Haneke’s “Amour” were disrupted by a protest from the French feminist group La Barbe (“the beard”), whose letter grieving the male-dominated line-up was published in Le Monde and The Guardian newspapers. The interference bemused those whom it supposedly targeted: if one weren’t familiar with the plight, they may have found the message unclear — the five women arrived sporting fake beards and, in the evening’s torrential downpour, carried signs saying, “Marveilleux,” “Merci!!!,” “Splendide,” “Incredible!” and, finally, “Le Barbe.” A sardonic approach, yes, but is it Cannes who is truly at fault? The festival’s artistic director, Thierry Fremaux, espoused the fairness of his, and the rest of the committee’s, decisions in a statement that maintained “films were chosen ‘without regard to race, color, sex, language, religion, political opinion,’ or any other external factor.” Andrea Arnold, a British filmmaker who serves on this year’s Cannes jury, insisted that the bigger problem at hand is “the lack of female directors making feature films.”

Female actresses with roles in films eligible at Cannes are not exactly feeling the source of the furor. Jessica Chastain, who is featured in “Lawless,” was plain-spoken about the situation and its validity: “I think it’s silly … I think a film should be judged on the film and not on the sex of the person who directed the film.” She went on to note that a multitude of women are serving on the Cannes prize jury, and spoke in agreement with Arnold as far as the real problem being a lack of females in the film industry as a whole. Her co-star, Mia Wasikowska, concurred in that “at the end of the day, it’s about the best film.”

Catherine Furey, 38, of the UK, died in December 2010 after drinking concentrated vinegar, a DIY abortion she read about on the Internet. Furey had a “violent reaction” to the vinegar, was rushed to the hospital and died.

The details of her death have only know come out in relation to a trial against Furey’s sister-in-law, Dawn Chadwick, who handed Furey the vinegar bottle. Arrested in 2011, Chadwick was later charged with “unlawfully supplying a poisonous or noxious substance with the intent to cause the miscarriage of a woman.” The charge was later upgraded to manslaughter, but she was eventually cleared of wrongdoing. The families of the two women, through their lawyers, have issued statements saying they do not blame the sister-in-law for Catherine Furey’s death.

The families’ cite Dawn Chadwick’s “significant learning disabilities” as part of the reason for their forgiveness and called the various charges against her a “second tragedy.”