Cannes Film Festival director Thierry Fremaux and president Pierre Lescure on Thursday unveiled the lineup for the iconic Côte d'Azur event's 70th anniversary edition, to be held May 17-28.
Bringing some Hollywood presence to the Croisette this year will be
Todd Haynes' period drama Wonderstruck, starring Julianne Moore and Michelle Williams, and
Sofia Coppola's The Beguiled, with
Colin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Kirsten Dunst and
Elle Fanning. Cannes veterans Michael Haneke, who won the Palme d'Or twice before, and
Michel Hazanavicius also are returning with Happy End and Le Redoutable, respectively.
Fremaux and Lescure took to the stage just after 11 a.m. local time, kicking off the traditional lineup press conference at Paris' UGC Cinema on the French capital's Champs Elysees.
Lescure opened the press event by mentioning the upcoming French election and U.S. President
Donald Trump. "We are in a suspenseful moment for the world," he said, adding, "Since we have a new surprise every day from Donald Trump, I hope North Korea, Syria will not cast a shadow" over Cannes.
'Okja'
Cannes Competition Lineup: The 19 Films Battling for the Palme d'Or
The festival will include 19 competition titles, four out-of-competition titles, three midnight screenings, one special screening and nine first films from 1,930 submitted movies. Fremaux said 12 female directors will be featured in the official selection, up from nine last year.
Benny and Josh Safdie's
Good Time, a crime drama starring
Robert Pattinson, and Lynne Ramsay's
You Were Never Really Here, toplined by
Joaquin Phoenix, will be among the titles bringing extra star power to the Cannes red carpet.
And speaking of star power,
Nicole Kidman will feature in four competition and other section entries, having the biggest presence of all the bold names at the fest next month.
The first competition title unveiled was
Andrei Zvyagintsev's new film
Loveless. After his success with Leviathan, the Russian culture ministry had said Zvyagintsev would get no more state money for his productions, so the film was made without official Russian support and instead put together as a co-production with Germany, France and Belgium, with Eurimages support. Fremaux spoke about a revival of Russian filmmaking in discussing the lineup.
Also in the Cannes lineup is Al Gore's
An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, which follows Gore as he travels the world raising awareness of climate change and trying to push people and governments to embrace renewable energy. Additional political edge comes from a Vanessa Redgrave documentary about refugees called Sea Sorrow.
Adding high-profile TV projects for the first time, Cannes will also screen two episodes of
David Lynch's Twin Peaks revival for Showtime and show Jane Campion's T
op of the Lake 2 as special events.
As previously announced, Spanish director
Pedro Almodovar will oversee the main competition jury that will award the Palme d'Or and other top prizes.
Palme d'Or winner
Cristian Mungiu will head up the student and short films jury, and Cesar-winning French actress Sandrine Kiberlain will head the Camera d'Or jury, which selects the best first film from across all sections and sidebars.
Isabelle Huppert in the Women in Motion poster
Cannes:
Isabelle Huppert to Serve as Face of Women in Motion
Among Thursday's first announcements was that a short virtual reality project from Alejandro G. Inarritu will be part of the festival, as will Kristen Stewart's short film
Come Swim.
Inarritu's VR short was produced and financed by Legendary Entertainment and Fondazione Prada, while ILMxLAB, Lucasfilm’s recently established immersive entertainment division, built the virtual world and characters. It explores the experience of a group of immigrants as they cross over the border between Mexico and the U.S. Inarritu, who spent four years developing the project, partnered with his frequent collaborator and cinematographer
Emmanuel Lubezki on it.
The poster for this year's festival, which shows an exuberant
Claudia Cardinale dancing, has been a source of controversy, with fans expressing outrage that the actress appeared to be slimmed down and retouched.
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