Cannes Film Festival: what are the 21 films in competition for the Palme d’Or?

Who to succeed French director Julia Ducournau, who won the trophy with Titane last year
? The president of the Cannes festival, Pierre Lescure and his general delegate, Thierry Frémaux, announced on Thursday April 14 the official selection of the 75th edition, which takes place from May 17 to 28 with actress Virginie Efira as mistress of ceremonies. . A slightly modified list since.

To arrive at this selection, 2,200 films were viewed. Four directors already rewardeds with a Palme d’or are in competition, including the Dardennes brothers and Ruben Ostlund. The general delegate of the Cannes festival specified that 35,000 people are accredited this year to participate in the event, against just over 20,000 last year.

The film “Cut!” by Michel Hazanavicius, a remake of a low-budget, gory, schoolboy Japanese zombie comedy, opened the festival on Tuesday, May 17. The feature film was released in theaters at the same time. The director, who marked the history of the Cannes festival with The Artist, experienced reverses of fortune in competition at Cannes, with “The Search” (2014), very poorly received by critics. The pressure is much less this time, the opening film being presented out of competition.

The 21 films in competition for the Palme d’Or

• holy spider by Ali Abbasi. In this thriller, the Dane of Iranian origin follows a journalist from Tehran investigating a series of feminicides. These crimes would be the work of a man who claims to purify the city of its sins.
• The Almond Trees by Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi. This is a film about the Amandiers theater school founded by the French director Patrice Chéreau, against the backdrop of the raging AIDS.
• The Crimes of the Future by David Cronenberg. In this anticipation film from the Canadian director, it is about transhumanism and the removal of organs with Viggo Mortensen, Léa Seydoux and Kristen Stewart.
• Tori and Lokita by Luc Dardenne and Jean-Pierre Dardenne. The Dardenne brothers, the most famous representatives of social cinema, already twice webbed in Cannes, tell in this film the friendship of two African teenagers exiled in Belgium and who live in precarious living conditions.
• Stars at Noon by Claire Denis. Shot in Central America, it is a “film of expectation, of atmosphere, on the edge of the diplomatic thriller” according to Thierry Frémaux, the general delegate of the Cannes Film Festival.
• Brother and sister by Arnaud Desplechin. In the continuity of his “Conte de Noël” (2008), Arnaud Desplechin films a family drama with two brothers and sisters in long-term conflict reunited by the death of their parents. With Marion Cotillard and Melvil Poupaud.
• Close by Lukas Dhont. The Belgian director deals with friendship through two teenagers suddenly separated by tragedy. “Girl”, his first film on transidentity, won him the Camera d’or in 2018.
• Armageddon Time by James Gray. It is a chronicle of adolescence carried by Anne Hathaway and Anthony Hopkins located in the heart of New York in the 1980s, in a school governed by the father of Donald Trump.
• broker by Hirokazu Kore-eda. After his Palme d’Or for “A family affair” (2018), the great regular on the Croisette took a step aside towards South Korea, taking on the star of “Parasite”, Song Kang-ho, for a new story of families, where it will be a question of baby boxes.
• Nostalgia by Mario Martone. These are the Neapolitan director’s first steps in competition. In this film, he pays homage to his city through a dramatic adaptation of the novel “Nostalgia” by Italian writer and journalist Ermanno Rea.
• NMR by Cristian Mungiu. Palme d’Or for “4 months, 3 weeks, 2 days”, a drama on abortion and corruption, Cristian Mungiu continues to examine the ills of Romania with a film, shot in a village in Transylvania, evoking the effect of European policies, relations between communities and the destiny of a country.
• Without filter by Ruben Ostlund. In this satirical comedy, Sweden’s grittiest director follows the passengers of a luxury cruise, stranded on a desert island and led by a Marxist ship’s captain.
• Decision to Leave by Park Chan-Wook. He marked the Croisette with the ultra-violent “Old boy” (Grand Prix 2004), the Korean should again intrigue with an investigator who must elucidate the murder of a man found in the mountains, whose main suspect is other than the victim’s wife.
• Showing-up by Kelly Reichardt. A great figure in independent cinema, the American in minimalist cinema (“First Cow”) finds one of her favorite actresses, Michelle Williams, for a film on the daily life of an artist and how she draws inspiration from her life.
• Leila’s brothers by Saeed Roustaee. The Iranian had already impressed with his punchy thriller, “The Law of Tehran”, on drug trafficking. It arrives in Cannes with the story of a young woman whose family is overwhelmed with debt, who tries to start a family business.
• Boy from Heaven by Tarik Saleh. After the success of “Confidential Cairo” (2017), a sticky thriller on corruption, the Swedish director of Egyptian origin reconnects with his favorite actor, Fares Fares, for a new dive into contemporary Egypt. A power struggle between the religious and political elites of the country.
• Tchaikovsky’s Wife by Kirill Serebrennikov. The Russian director, based in Berlin after leaving Russia in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, is in competition for the third time, with a historical film around the composer Tchaikovsky.
• Hi-han (Eo) by Jerzy Skolimowski. At 84, this great Polish filmmaker tells the story of a donkey rejected from a Polish circus to a stable of horses, before being taken to the Alps, according to many adventures.
• pacification by Albert Serra.The Spaniard, who had filmed “The Death of Louis XIV” in 2016 with Jean-Pierre Léaud in the role of the dying sovereign, settled in Tahiti for this story of love and writing, with Benoît Magimel in French diplomat.
• A little brother by Leonor Serraille. Noticed in 2017 with “Young girl”, the French director tells here the story of a family from immigration, from the end of the 1980s to the present day in the Parisian suburbs.
• The Eight Mountains by Charlotte Vandermeersch and Felix Van Groeningen. The actress adapts with the director of “Alabama Monroe” the novel by Italian Paolo Cognetti. It tells of the bonds of friendship between Pietro and Bruno, a boy from the city and another from the mountains.

This year again, few directors are in competition for the Palme d’or: only five out of 21 films: Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, Léonor Serraille, Claire Denis, Kelly Reichardt and Charlotte Vandermeersch. It is however a record for the Cannes festival!

Tom Cruise on the Croisette

Among the films presented out of competition, Tom Cruise is back in the cockpit to present, 35 years later, a sequel to the mythical Top Gun, “Top Gun: Maverick”. Also to follow, the highly anticipated biopic Elvis by Baz Luhrmann (“Red Mill”). There will also be November by Cedric Jimenez, Three thousand years of longing (Three thousand years waiting for you) by George Miller and Masquerade by Nicolas Bedos, a film shot in Nice.