Courier Mail
NEVER take a bone away from a hungry dog. So everyone waited until French model Noemie Lenoir satisfied her craving for the Cannes red carpet limelight.
This wannabe actress deserves a prize for her red carpet performance: blowing kisses, waving and poking her derriere at the cameras (while obscuring her companion).
She is the face of a British retail chain Marks & Spencer.
And she's the wife of French international football player Claude Makelele, of Chelsea FC - she's a WAG (that's what they call the wives and girlfriends of jocks).
Had the Palm Dog judges seen this WAG's red carpet play perhaps Lucy, the winner of this year's Palm Dog, would have missed out entirely.
Poor Lucy, a New York mutt from Queens, didn't make it to Cannes but she did win the Palm Dog for her work in
Wendy and Lucy, a film by her owner Kelly Reichardt.
I know it's cruel. Lucy should have walked that red carpet since she won the prize. Not Noemie.
The Palm Dog - a play on the Cannes Festival's supreme prize the Palme d'Or (a gold palm leaf) - recognises the invaluable contribution of dogs to film.
Last year, it was shared by a cartoon mutt from the film
Persepolis and two real Thai canines.
In 2006 it went to Mops, a doll-sized dog that featured in Sofia Coppola's
Marie Antoinette.
One year it went to a hound that was no more than a chalk outline in
Dogville by Denmark's Lars von Trier - many film fans applauded that as highly appropriate for a less than adequate film experience.
Next year there will be a clear winner.