75th birthday
Cannes Festival brings stars to the Croisette
Coveted trophy: the Golden Palm. Photo: Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
For its 75th birthday, the Cannes Film Festival promises to be glamorous. Films by Cronenberg and Serebrennikov are in competition. Tom Hanks and Kristen Stewart are expected on the red carpet.
Award-winning directors and international stars: The list of the 18 favorites that will be entered in the main competition in Cannes this year reads like a best of.
Among the star directors vying for the Palme d’Or are David Cronenberg, Kirill Serebrennikov, the Dardenne brothers and Christian Mungiu. However, as announced by the Festival General Delegate, Thierry Frémaux, the list is not yet complete. The festival, which celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, takes place from May 17th to 28th. No German director made it into the main competition.
Cronenberg will show the science fiction film “Crimes of the Future”. The story is about the human species being the subject of new transformations and mutations. For the film, the Canadian (“Cosmopolis”, “Maps to the Stars”) brought stars like Viggo Mortensen, Kristen Stewart and Léa Seydoux in front of the camera.
Star director Kirill Serebrennikov, who has long been persecuted by the Russian judiciary, presents «Tchaikovsky’s Wife», a film about his compatriot, the composer Peter Tchaikovsky. Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne are there with “Tori and Lokita”. The Belgian film brothers tell the story of a boy and a teenager from Africa who face the difficult conditions of their exile.
Loud palm winner
Swedish director Ruben Östlund, who won the Palme d’Or in 2017 for his social satire The Square, returns with Triangle of Sadness. A political comedy according to Frémaux.
Star director Park Chan-wook (“Oldboy”, “Stoker”) is also represented in the main competition again. This time the Korean presents the thriller “Decision to Leave”. Christian Mungiu, who won the Palme d’Or in Cannes in 2007 for “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”, shows “RMN”. The film by the Romanian director and screenwriter is about the history of his country.
Sequel to Top Gun
The films shown out of competition also promise a lot of glamor, such as “Top Gun: Maverick”, the sequel to the cult film in which Tom Cruise again plays the leading role. The film by the American director Joseph Kosinski continues the action story of the flying ace Maverick in part 2 more than 30 years later. For the biopic “Elvis” about the rock star who died in 1977, Baz Luhrmann brought Tom Hanks and Austin Butler in front of the camera.
Also out of competition is “Three Thousand Years of Longing” by Australian director George Miller, who became known with the “Mad Max” film series. Scottish Oscar winner Tilda Swinton («Michael Clayton», «Only Lovers Left Alive») and Idris Elba («Beasts of No Nation») play in the film about questions about the world and humanity.
The festival will open with «Z (Comme Z)» by French composer Michel Hazanavicius («The Artist»). According to Frémaux, the film is said to be a vampire comedy. He is also shown out of competition.
The Austrian Marie Kreutzer made it onto the list of the renowned side series “Un Certain Regard” with “Corsage”, a historical drama about the aged Empress Elisabeth of Austria-Hungary. Here, too, according to Frémaux, the 15 films so far can be supplemented by two or three contributions. The name of the president of the jury who will succeed Spike Lee is not yet known.