Cnn
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For fifteen days in May, Cannes hosts more stars than in the sky (or the old MGM backlot). This year, the French film festival will be even more delicate than usual as WHO’S-WHO of Hollywood talented will descend on the French Riviera to rub shoulders with the great and good of the international cinematic community.
All the signs indicate a stellar year for Cannes, on a strong Oscar performance, the filmmakers queuing to hit the red carpet and risk the beards of private sleep criticism.
The American festival quota, which begins on Tuesday, is large. Tom Cruise returns to Cannes three years after “Top Gun: Maverick” with “Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning”, hoping to repeat the winning formula which propelled “Maverick” to a billion dollars at the box office. No golden palm, or for the cruise, this time; Instead, this will be given to Cannes used Robert de Niro, a year before the 50th anniversary of “Taxi Driver” winning the Palme d’Or. Spike Lee, who was president of the jury in 2021 (Not without incident) will also come back with “the highest 2 lower”, his riff on “High to Low” by Akira Kurosawa (1963), with Denzel Washington as a targeted music magnate with a ransom plot.
“High 2 Lowst” will play out of the competition alongside Ethan Coen comedy “Honey Don’t!,” His follow-up of “Drive Away Dolls” from last year, the second title of his so-called “Lesbian film b trilogy. “Whether it’s simply a stacked range or baking Theatrical windows and French law (Lee’s film will arrive Apple TV + in September, probably in the process of having a chance to go out in France), it is a sign of healthy health of the festival that these heavyweights of Cannes do not do it for a palm of gold.
So who is? The competition for the first prize indicates a change of guard. Some cane pillars remain: twice winners of Palme The Dardens Brothers of Belgium with “Young Mothers”, Ukrainian Sergei Loznitsa with “Two Prosecutors”, and Lynne Ramsay in Scotland (“We need to talk of kevin”, “You Wast My Love”), whose adaptation of Ariana and Dress Harwicz’s In play Jawenrs Pattinson. Wes Anderson will also compete for the fourth time with “The Phoenic Scheme”, featuring some of his usual players (Bill Murray, Jeffrey Wright) and new delicious additions (rice Ahmed, Mia Threacleton, daughter of Kate Winslet). Add comrades Tom Hanks, Scarlett Johansson, Benicio Del Toro, Willem Dafoe and more and you have the most starred red carpet in the festival.
Joachim Trier, who climbed the ranks to Cannes before bursting into the general public with the multi-ossar candidate “The worst person of the world” (2021) finds the reintegration of lead reintegration for the long -awaited “sentimental value”, which also features Stellan Skarsgård. The Iranian author Jafar Panahi, Including the 2011 film “This is not a movie” was introduced as a smuggling at the festival on a USB stick hidden inside a cakewill be back in competition with “A simple accident”, his follow -up of the “No Bears” of 2022, which won the first prize at the Venice Film Festival. Thus, the American Indie Queen Kelly Reichardt, last in Cannes with “Present yourself” And now by making its beginnings “The Mastermind”, a period of vintage robbery led by Josh O’Connor, who plays in two competition films-the other being “The History of Sound”, directed by South African Oliver Hermanus and co-directed by Paul MESCAL.
Hermanus is part of a series of new arrivals in competition, including the Spaniard Carla Simón, winner of Berlinale in 2022, launching “Romería” and the German director Mascha Schilinski with “Sound of Falling”. The latter, previously entitled “The Doctor says that I am well, but I feel blue”, follows four generations of united women by trauma, and followed an important buzz for months leading to the festival – even more notable given the low profile of Schilinski.
Reichardt, Ramsay, Simón and Schilinski are four of the seven women nominated for the palm this year – a third of the total of the competition and a positive stage in the quest for the festival for better representation between the sexes. However, none follows a palm of gold like Julia Ducournau. Ducournau “Titanium” Triummphed in 2021 and she returned with “Alpha”, apparently a body horror against an AIDS epidemic. Already bought by Neon, the public should expect another provocative film.
Speaking, Ari ASTER (“Hereditary”, “Midsommar”) makes you bow with “Eddington”. Landing A poster referring to the AIDS crisis of the 1980s And the rumor could be defined during the pandemic of COVID-19, the film finds Aster with its “Beautiful is afraid” Star Joaquin Phoenix as a sheriff of New Mexico in a confrontation with the mayor of Pedro Pascal.
The Palme d’Or jury, led by French actress Juliette Binoche and featured Halle Berry and the actor of “succession” Jeremy Strong, will watch the ground with 22 films and announce a winner on May 24.
Elsewhere at the festival, the actors walk behind the camera. In the category of filmmakers of the UN rise in power, Kristen Stewart directs Imogen Pots in “The Chronology of Water”, an adaptation of the memory of Lidia Yuknavitch. “Eleanor The Great” by Scarlett Johansson features June Squibb, and Harris Dickinson – for the last time attractive Nicole Kidman in “Babygirl” – writes and directs “Urchin”, located in the streets of London. It is also remarkable in the UN, it is a hot title “The shadow of my father,According to the very first Nigerian film of the official selection of Cannes.
The festival has never hesitated to program films covering world events in progress, and the War of Israel-Hamas will be referenced on the screen. The Israeli director Nadav Lapid will bring his social satire brand to the fortnight of directors with “Yes!,” a film taking place following the October 7 attacks. In the meantime, “Put your soul on your hand and walk,” By the Iranian filmmaker Sepideh Farsi, the screens in the acid section and profile the war documentary maker Fatima Hassouna. The film is already seen in a new light after Hassouna, who had covered the conflict on the ground in Gaza, was killed in an Israeli strike the day after the festival announcement.
There is also a high dose of reality behind the scenes. By taking a step back from the first, the Cannes animated film market will likely discuss if The announcement of President Donald Trump that he intends to present prices on films “produced in foreign land” will manage to pass – and if so, how it could be implemented.
Aside from late American political announcements, Cannes moves in its latest edition. The festival screened nearly 3,000 films to organize its official selection, and the programmers made the big name after a big name in its range until the eleventh hour. Many should be wrong for 2025 not be a vintage year.
Whisper it quietly, but it was completely the turnaround. During a large part of the aughts, Cannes was locked in a cold war with the Venice Film Festival on which could take the most exciting titles. Cannes fought with a hand tied behind his back; Venice had – A – A policy with open doors to large -scale streamers, while Cannes said “no” to include them in its range of competition. Venice quickly became the starting pistol for the awards season.
But then Cannes had a notable victory with Bong Joon Ho “Parasite,” The winner of Palme d’Or 2019 and winner of the best film at the Academy Awards in 2020-the first winner of the best non-English-speaking film, and the first film to make the double of Cannes-Oscar since “Marty” in 1955. The festival, a champion of world cinema, which is normally positioned above the island tastes of the Academy, knew the importance of the moment. He was a win-win, repositioning Cannes in the conversation of the Oscars without having to compromise the mission of the festival.
Since then, Cannes has been on a role of Oscars (undoubtedly helped by the internationalization of the Academy). Including “parasite”, four of the last five winners of Palme d’Or have been the nominees for the best films. The winners of the Oscars “Anatomy of a Fall” and “The Zone of Interest” were presented in Cannes in 2023, while last year’s edition featured “The Substance”, “Emilia Perez”, “Flow” and “Anora”, which swept the Academy prices and made the best image and the palm of double gold. Cannes will never need Oscars, but validation does not hurt.
For all the glamor and its A-List guests, the largest asset of the festival is its ability to pick a success from nowhere and to define a director and their film on a dizzying trajectory. What will break out in 2025? We do not yet know – and that is why all this is so exciting.
The Cannes Film Festival takes place from May 13 to 24.