The stars were out for the opening festival at the Cannes film festival, and they sure were gorgeous. The first film to open the 12 day film festival on the Riveria is Blindness. The film by Brazilian director Fernando Meirelles is based on a 1955 novel in which an entire city goes blind after an epidemic. Julianne Moore plays one of the few people who is unaffected and retains her sight. She tries to hide it from the rest of the city as society breaks down from the effects of the change. Blindness also stars Mark Ruffalo, Danny Glover, and Gael García Bernal.

The 9 person jury at Cannes includes Natalie Portman and is headed by Sean Penn. Penn didn’t miss a chance to rip on US President George Bush while talking to the press at the event. It’s likely that he was asked directly about it, and he is quoted by Reuters as saying “When somebody operates without a brain and without a heart, they kill hundreds of thousands of people around the world.” I dislike Bush as much as the next person, but there are much better ways of phrasing that. It’s lame to personally attack someone in such a blunt way when you can state more compelling reasons for disliking the guy. Bush definitely has a heart and a brain, he just choses when to use them. When it involves money, they’re easily switched off and immune to suffering, death and general havok-wrecking. Reuters notes that Penn then smoked a cigarette “in defiance of French anti-smoking laws.” You would think he would be afraid of setting that ridiculous hair on fire.

Shown at the opening ceremony at Cannes are Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman, Eva Longoria (who’s still looking pregnant to me), Rachida Brakni, Aishwarya Rai, Gillian Anderson, Sean Penn (the hair!), Julianne Moore, Gael García Bernal, Mischa Barton, Danny Glover, and Bar Rafaeli.

Estranged couple Sean Penn and Robin Wright Penn have just reconciled. The couple filed for divorce last month amid rumors that Sean had been cheating. Sean was photographed with model Petra Nemcova at various Oscar parties, but apparently he’s had a change of heart. At a recent Eddie Vedder concert, Sean and Robin were seen together, and Sean even dedicated a song to her. I guess those lame moves actually work on some women, because that same day, Robin dropped her divorce case.

Sean Penn’s divorce to Robin Wright Penn has been called off.

Court officials confirm to Extra that a dismissal was filed and granted on Tuesday.

The same day, Extra reported the pair hit an Eddie Vedder concert in San Francisco, where Penn, 47 — who flirted with Petra Nemcova at the Oscars — dedicated a song to his wife, 42, on stage for her birthday.

He originally filed divorce papers in Marin County December 7, his attorney Mindy Ross told Usmagazine.com, but the petition was dismissed December 18.

On December 21, she filed her own request for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. Penn’s divorce papers listed November 30 as the date of their separation; she listed the split date as December 1.

The couple, who have been married for over 11 years, have two kids: Dylan Francis, 16, and Hopper Jack, 14.

[From Us Weekly]

Sean and Robin have a reputation for being emotional, volatile and up-and-down with each other, even when they are working together on a project. Famed director John Cassavetes, who directed the couple in “She’s So Lovely,” said that working with them was difficult. “The beginning and the end of every day is how Sean and Robin are getting along,” the director said during shooting in 1997. “If they have a bad morning, Sean’s broken up about it.”

I hope it works out for the couple this time. But I can’t help but wonder if maybe Sean went divorce-attorney-shopping after the papers were filed, and found out what it would cost him to divorce his wife of 11 years in the State of California. Yep, I’m romantic that way.

Let’s be honest: the best part of awards shows are all the little bits of gossip you hear afterwards. Like Jon Stewart was actually drunk as a skunk during the whole ceremony last night. Or Jack Nicholson and Javier Bardem got in a fistfight, and Javier sat on Jack’s head. Okay none of those things actually happened, but how much would it rock if they did? Well a little bit of juicy gossip that does appear to be true: it seems Sean Penn and Petra Nemcova are hooking up.

Newly single Sean Penn and supermodel Petra Nemcova slipped out of LA’s Villa nightclub at 3:10 a.m. this morning–clearly Hollywood’s hottest new item.

The pair followed up an appearance at a CAA event two days ago with a full-on assault of coupledom tonight at Elton John’s Oscar Party (above). Sean, 47, and Petra, 28, posed on the red carpet at the singer’s AIDS Foundation fete and danced to his many hits before heading to Villa.

[From Page Six]

Further confirmation comes from People. While they say there was no “clear cut PDA” when Petra was asked about Penn, she noted, “Yes, we are friends. He is on the advisory board of my charity.”

I can’t really explain why, but somehow this pairing strikes me as odd. Penn is nineteen years old than Nemcova, but I don’t think that’s what really seems odd. He just looks like he should be out living in a tree somewhere, while she looks like her image should be chiseled in marble or something. He’s very rustic and asymmetrical. And she is highly symmetrical. And since I can’t think of any other way to explain why I don’t think these two go together, I’m going to rely on symmetry (and a lack thereof) to be my main argument.

Sean Penn split from wife Robin Wright Penn right after Christmas; with both parties citing the traditional “irreconcilable differences” as the reason for their divorce. The San Francisco Gate reports that Robin is now dating her ex-boyfriend from the 90s, Jason Patric. It seems fast, but they’re both moving on with their lives and that’s probably for the best. And Jason Patric is much more symmetrical than Sean Penn.

Apparently Sean Penn decided to end his marriage with a bang. So to speak. According to MSNBC and various media outlets, Penn had a threesome with two drunk Russian girls. He had gone on vacation with wife Robin Wright Penn right before Christmas, but had booked separate suites for each of them. So clearly things weren’t exactly cozy before all of this. Robin Wright hardly saw Penn on vacation, and was pissed that she was spending all her time alone. When she went to Penn’s room, she found him in bed with two drunk women. Penn supposedly didn’t care, and continued to party into the night.

Sean Penn was served with divorce papers by his wife Robin after the actress allegedly found him in bed with two other women. Magazine Star has revealed details of the couple’s last weekend together and claimed the Mystic River star was caught being unfaithful to his partner of 11 years.

The actors were reportedly staying at the Squaw Valley resort in Lake Tahoe, California, days before Christmas when the incident is said to have occurred, according to MSNBC.com. A source tells the publication, “Sean didn’t spend much time with his wife - he booked her a separate suite - and when Robin got fed up with being alone, she went over to his suite. (There, she) found him drunk with two Russian girls.”

Penn married Wright in 1996 and they have two children together, Dylan Frances, 16, and Hopper Jack, 14. Wright filed divorce papers in California on December 21, citing irreconcilable differences as a reason for the split. The couple are said to be seeking joint custody of their teenage kids.

[From Starpulse]

There’s always been something about Sean Penn that I’ve found distasteful. I thought it was the constant sneer plastered across his face, but now I think it probably has more to do with the sleazebag, ignoring your wife, having sex with strangers thing. Something tells me the two have a prenup, but if they don’t this could get pretty messy for him.

Update by Celebitchy: The Star article doesn’t say that Robin found Sean in bed with two Russian woman, just that she found him drunk and hanging out with them in his room. The article is being misquoted:

“Sean didn’t spend much time with his wife - he booked her a separate suite - and when Robin got fed up with being along, she went over to his suite and found him drunk with two Russian girls!” says a source. “He’d already finished a couple of bottles of champagne.”

Robin, 41, went nuclear, but Sean “just told her to leave and continued drinking,” reveals the source. Sean, 47, even flirted with the women in front of Robin, whom he married in 1996 after the birth of their children, daughter Dylan, 16, and son Hopper, 14. “He was acting like he just didn’t care,” says the source.

[From Star Magazine, print edition, January 14, 2008]

The article goes on to say that Penn tried to order champagne from room service at 3 am and then had someone drive him to a 7-Eleven when there wasn’t room service available at that time. He then found that he wasn’t able to buy booze after 2 am. That hardly sounds like someone who’s having a threesome. If you’re busy having sex you’re not about to get antsy over not getting booze.

Sean Penn and Robin Wright Penn have confirmed through their rep that they are divorcing, after 11 years of marriage. It’s sad that they aren’t quite managing ’til death’, but 11 years is a Hollywood lifetime, isn’t it?

One of Hollywood’s longer lasting unions, between actor Sean Penn and his wife Robin Wright Penn is over, as the couple confirmed they are divorcing.

The couple, who married in 1996, have two children together, Hopper Jack, 14, and Dylan Frances, 16.

According to People Magazine, the divorce was confirmed by the couple’s spokesperson.

The Daily Mail

Sean and Robin have acted in movies together, and started dating in the early 1990s shortly after his divorce from Madonna. They split briefly in 1996 and he dated Alaskan singer Jewel, and that relationship inspired several songs on her album Pieces Of You.

It’s always sad when a marriage ends, particularly when children are involved, the possible exception to this rule being when you hit Las Vegas and get married just for fun, and have to get an annullment. Then it is amusing for everyone, except possibly the couple who got married. For them it’s mostly embarrassing.

Picture note by Celebitchy: Sean Penn and Robin Wright Penn are shown at the Into The Wild premiere on 9/18/07, thanks to WENN.

It seems that I’m not the only one who has hazy memories of the eighties. Of course, that may be because for me the eighties were about pre-school and toilet training. Sean Penn is just trying to block out his marriage and divorce.

Sean was married to Madonna for four years after they wed in 1985, when she was absolutely huge. She dedicated her True Blue album to him, the “coolest guy in the universe.” According to Sean though, he wasn’t cool at all. He was vain and drunk.

He says: “She was a phenomenon, but nothing could have told anybody what would happen next. I describe that marriage as loud. That’s how I remember it. I don’t recall having a single conversation in four years of marriage.

“I’ve talked to her a few times since, and there’s a whole person there. I just didn’t know it. I was just living in my own head. Who was it that said: ‘Men are vain, particularly young men’? That was me, and I liked to drink a lot.

“I’m not saying it was meaningless. I’ve carried over the lessons to things more applicable now.”

Ireland Online

I’m glad that the marriage had meaning, particularly given that Sean spent time in jail during it, after assaulting an invasive photographer. They were the Brangelina of the times, and dubbed the “Poison Penns”. Don’t you remember?

While looking up the dates of the marriage I stumbled across this gem on Wikipedia. When Sean was in prison during his marriage to Madonna for assaulting a paparazzo, he was asked for an autograph by another inmate. He wrote “Dear Richard, it is impossible to be incarcerated and not feel a kinship with your fellow inmates. Well Richard I have done the impossible I feel absolutely no kinship with you. Sean Penn.” Richard responded by telling Sean to “Stay in touch and hit them again.”

Picture note by Celebitchy: Header image is of Sean Penn and Madonna in 1988, thanks to IMDB. Stills from Shanghai Surprise thanks to DVD Active and Blogs.Tampabay.com. Other images from Schlampfie.de.