Global names on Cannes jury to decide coveted Palme d ’Or

The make-up of this year’s Cannes jury, headed by US actor Robert De Niro, means the coveted Palme d’Or’s winner will have global approval, with actors and directors from the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa.

Mr De Niro, 67, is the third American in four years to head the jury of the world’s most prestigious film festival, which starts tomorrow, after director Tim Burton in 2010 and actor-director Sean Penn in 2008.

Mr Burton’s jury selected Thai director Apichatpong Weera-sethakul’s art house film Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives for the Palme d’Or.

Tgere are many who are hoping that this year’s winner will be more accessible.

The nine-member jury also features Hong Kong director Johnny To and film producer Shi Nansun, who is also the wife of director Tsui Hark. Ms Shi produced Infernal Affairs, which Martin Scorsese remade as The Departed in 2006.

French director Olivier Assayas, an aficionado of Hong Kong and Chinese cinema who has cast Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung in his films even after their 2004 divorce, is also a juror.

Mr Assayas wrote about cinema and co-authored scripts with France’s André Techine before making his first film, Disorder, in 1986.

Mr To, 56, is a Cannes regular, having shown five times at the world’s biggest film festival, most recently in 2009 with the crime film Vengeance.

From Hollywood, Quentin Tarantino’s favourite Uma Thurman (Pulp Fiction) and Britain’s Jude Law (Sherlock Holmes) join Chadian director Saleh Haroun, whose feature A Screaming Man won the Jury Prize at Cannes in 2010.

War forced Mr Haroun to move to France, where he worked as a journalist before making his first film in 1994.

Ms Thurman played opposite Mr De Niro in Mad Dog and Glory, which was presented at Cannes in 1993.

Norwegian author and critic Linn Ullmann, who is the daughter of Swedish director Ingmar Bergman and one of his muses, Liv Ullmann, is also on the jury.

She came to the 1997 Cannes festival to receive the Palme des Palmes on behalf of her father.

Argentina’s Martina Gusman studied to be an artist in Buenos Aires before taking up acting and then producing.

Twenty films, the lion’s share from European directors, are in the running for the Palme d’Or, including The Skin That I Inhabit, the latest feature from Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar.

Serbian director Emir Kusturica is chairing the jury that will judge the parallel Un Certain Régard section of the festival, and South Korean directors Bong Joon-Ho and Lee Chang-Dong are overseeing the panels deciding the Camera d’Or for best film and the Critics ’ Week prizes respectively.

Presiding over the short-film jury is French film-maker Michel Gondry.

List of films on show

New releases from Japan, France, Israel, Australia, Turkey, Romania and the United States are among 20 films vying for the coveted Palme d’Or top prize at the Cannes film festival from tomorrow to May 22.

Following is a list of the films contending for the award, along with out-of-competition festival screenings and the parallel section Un certain régard, which showcases fresh talent.

English titles are given where cited by festival organisers.

Main competition
The Skin I Live In, Pedro Almodóvar (Spain)
House of Tolerance, Bertrand Bonello (France)
Pater, Alain Cavalier (France)
Footnote, Joseph Cedar (Israel)
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey)
The Kid With A Bike, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (Belgium)
The Artist, Michel Hazanavicius (France)
Le Havre, Aki Kaurismaki (Finland)
Hanezu No Tsuki, Naomi Kawase (Japan)
Sleeping Beauty, Julia Leigh (Australia). Debut feature.
Poliss, Maiwenn (aka Maiwenn Le Besco) (France)
The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick (United States)
La Source des Femmes, Radu Mihaileanu (Romania)
Hara-kiri: Death of a Samurai, Takashi Miike (Japan). 3D.
Habemus Papam, Nanni Moretti (Italy)
We Need To Talk About Kevin, Lynne Ramsay (Britain)
Michael, Markus Schleinzer (Austria). Debut film.
This Must Be The Place, Paolo Sorrentino (Italy)
Melancholia, Lars Von Trier (Denmark)
Drive, Nicolas Winding Refn (Danish film-maker, US production)

Out of Competition
Opening film: Midnight in Paris, Woody Allen (US)
Closing film: The Beloved, Christophe Honoré (France)
The Conquest, Xavier Durringer (France)
The Beaver, Jodie Foster (United States)
Pirates of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Rob Marshall (US) 3D
Bollywood: The Greatest Love Story Ever Told, Rakeysh Omprahkash Mehra and Jeffrey Zimbalist (India)
This Is Not a Film, Jafar Panahi (Iran). Special screening

Un certain régard
Restless, Gus Van Sant (United States)
The Hunter, Bakur Bakuradze (Russia)
Halt auf Freier Strecke, Andreas Dresen (Germany)
Hors Satan, Bruno Dumont (France)
Martha Marcy May Marlene, Sean Durkin (United States). Debut feature.
Les Neiges du Kilimandjaro, Robert Guediguian (France)
Skoonheid, Oliver Hermanus (South Africa)
The Day He Arrives, Hong Sangsoo (South Korea)
Bonsai, Cristian Jimenez (Chile)
Tatsumi, Eric Khoo (Singapore). Animated.
Arirang, Kim Ki-duk (South Korea)
Et maintenant on va où?, Nadine Labaki (Lebanon)
Loverboy, Catalin Mitulescu (Romania)
Yellow Sea, Na Hong-jin (South Korea)
Miss Bala, Gerardo Naranjo (Mexico)
Goodbye, Mohammad Rasoulof (Iran)
Hard Labor, Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra (Brazil). Debut feature.
The Minister, Pierre Schoeller (France)
Toomelah, Ivan Sen (Australia)
Oslo, August 31, Joachim Trier (Norway)
Elena, Andrey Zvyagintsev (Russia)

Special screenings
Out of Bounds, Frederikke Aspock (Denmark/USA). Debut feature.
No More Fear, Mourad Ben Cheikh (Tunisia)
Duch, Master of the Forges of Hell, Rithy Panh (Cambodia)
Michel Petrucciani, Michael Radford (Britain)
Larzac, Christian Rouaud (France)
The Big Fix, Josh Tickell (United States)

Midnight screenings
Wu Xia, Chan Peter Ho-Sun (China)
Days of Grace, Tekla Taidelli (Mexico). Debut film.