00:00 Now here in France, the organisers of the Cannes Film Festival have just announced which films will be competing for the top prize, the Palme d'Or this year.
00:08 France 24's Olivia Salazar-Winspear is here with more. You've been following the news for us, tell us what you know.
00:13 Okay, well there are a few familiar faces in the competition this year.
00:17 We're starting with French director Jacques Audier, he's got a film called Emilia Perez,
00:21 Selena Gomez is in that one, he's already won the Palme d'Or, so who knows, could be another one for him.
00:26 Russian filmmaker Kirill Serebrennikov, he's back at Cannes with a biopic of Eduard Limonov,
00:32 the Russian writer and dissident politician who will be played by Ben Whishaw.
00:36 Of course, Serebrennikov himself is not exactly a welcome artist in Putin's Russia, so he knows what he's talking about there.
00:41 Karim Aynuz returns to his native Brazil for a film, Motel Destino, that's after last year's period drama Firebrand, starring Alicia Vikander,
00:51 that was about Henry VIII's final wife, Catherine Parr.
00:54 And American director Sean Baker is back after the success of Red Rocket, he's got a film called Anora.
01:00 Paul Schrader, of course, famous screenwriter, director too, has a film called O Canada, starring Richard Gere and Uma Thurman.
01:08 And speaking of American productions, director of the Cannes Film Festival Thierry Fremont flagged up the strikes in Hollywood last year,
01:15 which has actually slowed down quite a few films, means they weren't ready in time for the festival.
01:21 One film that is ready is Francis Ford Coppola's latest release, that's called Megalopolis,
01:27 and it stars Adam Driver, Laurence Fishburne and Aubrey Plaza.
01:31 Now, Coppola is one of that select group of filmmakers who actually have won two Palme d'Ors, only nine people have done that.
01:38 He won one for The Conversation in 1974 and for Apocalypse Now in 1979, you might have heard of that one.
01:45 Canadian director David Cronenberg is also back at the film festival with his latest release,
01:51 as is Yorgos Lanthimos with his film Kinds of Kindness.
01:55 Now, of course, that stars Emma Stone, as is usual for him these days.
02:00 He directed her in Poor Things, which she won the Academy Award for just recently and the favourite in 2018.
02:07 So far, they've announced 19 films in the official competition.
02:12 They'll probably announce a few more in the coming days and weeks, that is quite common for them at the festival.
02:17 Four of them have been directed by women, it's always something that's flagged up, how many films were made by women.
02:23 I suspect another one will come along, directed by a woman.
02:27 But one high profile woman at the festival will be judging these films, of course,
02:32 that's the president of the jury this year, Greta Gerwig, hot on the heels of her success with the Barbie film last year, obviously.
02:39 Now, when it comes to prizes, one prize we already know about is the honorary Palme d'Or.
02:44 That will go to George Lucas of Star Wars fame for his career, his body of work, which is considerable, of course.
02:51 Plenty of treats out of competition as well, that's always the case at Cannes.
02:55 One is the very hotly anticipated Furiosa, that's the fifth instalment of George Miller's Mad Max series of films.
03:02 And we'll also get to see Kevin Costner's magnum opus, which is Horizon, an American saga.
03:08 That's a two-part western that's been many, many years in the making.
03:12 Apparently it's a passion project for Kevin Costner, it looks quite epic.
03:16 And do remember, of course, that it's in a month or so now, but we'll be bringing you all the latest coverage from the Cannes Film Festival live from the red carpet.
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