And so the competitors (and showmakers) of the world’s most esteemed film festival have been revealed this morning during the Conférence de Presse in Paris, officially kickstarting the butt-clenching excitement that is next month’s 66th Festival de Cannes. It is quite a list – Polanski, the Coen brothers, Payne, Ozon, Sorrentino, Gray, Farhadi, Soderbergh and Miike – all well-established auteurs that will battle it out for the much-coveted Palme D’Or. If this collection of names isn’t enough to make you book your tickets and jet-set right down to the Riviera, then I don’t know what will. Scroll down to the cinematic menu and get ready to drool.
Opening film: The Great Gatsby, dir: Baz Luhrmann
Closing film: Zulu, dir: Jérôme Salle
In Competition
Only God Forgives, dir: Nicolas Winding-Refn
La Grande Bellezza, dir: Paolo Sorrentino
Behind The Candelabra, Steven Soderbergh
The Immigrant, dir: James Gray
Venus In Fur, dir: Roman Polanski
Straw Shield, dir: Takashi Miike
Nebraska, dir: Alexander Payne
Jeune Et Jolie, dir: Francois Ozon
The Past, dir: Asghar Farhadi
Inside Llewyn Davis, dir: Joel & Ethan Coen
Jimmy P., dir: Arnaud Desplechin
Heli, dir: Amat Escalante
Grisgris, dir: Mahamat-Saleh Haroun
Like Father Like Son, dir: Hirokazu Kore-Eda
La Vie D’Adèle, dir: Abdellatif Kechiche
Borgman, dir: Alex Vann Warmerdam
A Touch Of Sin, dir: Zhangke Jia
Michael Kohlhaas, dir: Arnaud Despallières
Un Château En Italie, dir: Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi
Out of Competition
Blood Ties, dir: Guillaume Canet
All Is Lost, dir: J.C. Chandor
Un Certain Regard
The Bling Ring, dir: Sofia Coppola (Opening film)
Omar, dir: Hany Abu-Assad
Death March, dir: Adolfo Alix, Jr
Fruitvale Station: dir: Ryan Coogler
The Bastards, dir: Claire Denis
Norte, Hangganan Ng Kasaysayan, dir: Lav Diaz
As I Lay Dying, dir: James Franco
Miele, dir: Valeria Golino*
L’Inconnu Du Lac, dir: Alain Guiraudie
Bends, dir: Flora Lau
L’Image Manquante, dir: Rithy Panh
La Jaula De Oro, dir: Diego Quemada-Diez
Anonymous, dir: Mohammad Rasoulof
Sarah Préfère La Course, dir: Chloé Robichaud
Grand Central, dir: Rebecca Zlotowski
Midnight Screenings
Blind Detective, dir: Johnnie To
Monsoon Shootout, dir: Amit Kumar
Special Screenings
Seduced And Abandoned, dir: James Toback
Weekend Of A Champion, dir: Roman Polanski
Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fight, dir: Stephen Frears
Stop The Pounding Heart, dir: Roberto Minervini
Bite The Dust, dir: Taisia Igumentseva (Cinéfondation)
Homage to Jerry Lewis
Max Rose, dir: Daniel Noah
Gala Screening in Honor of India
Bombay Talkies, dirs: Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee, Zoya Akhtar, Karan Johar
And since I’m feeling generous, allow me to serve a few of the available selection of afters – the trailers of the films included in the list.
The lineup is undoubtedly strong, but there are a few titles that would have made the list look like Christmas on May – Linklater’s Before Midnight, McQueen’s Twelve Years of a Slave, Glazer’s Under The Skin, Dolan’s Tom a la Ferme, Folman’s The Congress and Jarmusch’s Only Lovers Left Alive. But we can’t have everything. For now, I am looking forward to a twelve-day regime of healthy and glorious cinematic diet that could very well be the most galvanising art consumption in my entire life.
Burp.
