Cannes Film Festival 2018: Cate Blanchett named festival jury; Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman, Jean-Luc Godard's Le Livre d'Image in Palme d'Or race

The lineup of the 71st Cannes Film Festival was today unveiled and Nandita Das’ directorial Manto has been shortlisted in Un Certain Regard category. Artistic director Thierry Fremaux and festival president Pierre Lescure announced the lineup of the films in a press conference which also went live on Facebook and Twitter. [caption id=“attachment_4429761” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  General Delegate of the Cannes Film Festival Thierry Fremaux (left) and festival President Pierre Lescure deliver their speech during a press conference for the presentation of the 71st Cannes film festival, in Paris, on 12 April, 2018. AP/ Francois Mori[/caption] Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman, Jean-Luc Godard’s Le Livre d’Image and Oscar-winning director Pawel Pawlikowski’s Zimna Wojna are among the 18 films competing for the prestigious Palme d’Or award. Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi’s psychological thriller Everybody Knows, starring real-life couple Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, will be the opening film at the festival. [caption id=“attachment_4429769” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem. AFP/Ander Gillenea[/caption] Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who was earlier under house arrest and is still not allowed to leave the country, also features in the competition segment with his Three Faces. Two-time Oscar winner Cate Blanchett was earlier announced as the president of the festival jury. She follows Pedro Almodovar, who headed the jury for the 70th edition of the event. Das’ Manto, starring Nawazuddin Siddiqui as celebrated short story writer Saadat Hasan Manto, is among the 15 films shortlisted in the Cannes sub section Un Certain Regard. It will compete with films such as Angel Face (Vanessa Filho), Border (Ali Abbasi), El Angel (Luis Ortega), Euphoria (Valeria Golino), Friend (Wanuri Kahiu) and others. Un Certain Regard (A certain glance) was first introduced in section in 1998 and focuses on films with unusual themes or storytelling techniques. It runs parallel to the main competition. Benicio Del Toro will preside over the jury of Un Certain Regard. Films announced in the special screenings section includes Gilles Porte’s documentary The State Against Mandela and The Others, 10 Years in Thailand, which has contributions from Aditya Assarat, Wisit Sasanatieng, Chulayarnon Sriphol and Apichatpong Weerasethakul; and Wim Wenders’s documentary, Pope Francis - A Man of his Word. Ron Howard-directed Solo: A Star Wars Story, which traces the origins of iconic Star Wars character Han Solo, will be screened at the festival as an out of the competition entry. It will be joined by Le Grand Bain from Gilles Lellouche. As was the case with The Square, which entered late in the competition but went on to bag the Palme d’Or, Fremaux said several more titles may be announced in coming days. - A look at films competing for Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival 2018 - From an African-American detective infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan to Kurdish female fighters battling jihadists, here are the movies that will battle it out for the top Palme d’Or prize at next month’s Cannes film festival: Everbody Knows Iranian master Asghar Farhadi will kick off the festival with a psychological thriller about a family reunion going awry, featuring Spanish stars Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem. While Farhadi, 45, won an Oscar and the Golden Bear at Berlin for his 2011 breakthrough film, A Separation, he is yet to take home the coveted French prize. BlacKkKlansman [caption id=“attachment_4429771” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  Spike Lee. AFP/ Dia Dipasupil[/caption] US director and activist Spike Lee’s drama is based on the real-life story of an African-American police officer who infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan in 1978. John David Washington plays him with Adam Driver as his Jewish police partner. The film will open in the US on the first anniversary of a white supremacist march in Charlottesville where an anti-racism activist was killed. Under the Silver Lake Four years after giving Cannes audiences nightmares with his thriller It Follows, David Robert Mitchell returns with another spine-chiller, this time about the mysterious murder of a billionaire. Three Faces Little is known about this portrait of three women by the Iranian dissident Jafar Panahi, who is banned from travel by Tehran. The festival has pleaded with the authorities to let the director, who has faced years of harassment and arrest, to fly to Cannes to show his film. Leto Russia’s Kirill Serebrennikov is another director who may not be able to present his work at Cannes. Under house arrest over allegations of embezzlement, his film focuses on Soviet rock star Viktor Tsoi and the birth of Russian underground music in the 1980s. At War [caption id=“attachment_4429773” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  Stephane Brize. AFP/ Filippo Monteforte[/caption] As France grapples with mass strikes, French director Stephane Brize’s gritty drama about factory workers battling to keep their jobs may hit a timely nerve. Dogman Italian director Matteo Garrone’s new work is not for the faint-hearted. Dubbed an “urban Western”, the film is inspired by the gruesome murder by dog groomer and cocaine addict Pietro De Negri in the late 1980s. Cold War Amazon Studios is pinning its hopes on this period romance from Oscar-winning Polish-British director Pawel Pawlikowski set in Eastern Europe in the 1950s. Le Livre d’image Little has been revealed about this new film by French-Swiss legend Jean-Luc Godard other than this enigmatic synopsis: “Nothing but silence, nothing but a revolutionary song, a story in five chapters like the five fingers of a hand.” Capernaum Lebanese actress-turned-filmmaker Nadine Labaki’s third film is set in a Middle Eastern town. Her previous film Where Do We Go Now? premiered at Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section in 2010. Burning South Korean auteur Lee Chang-dong’s new mystery drama is drawn from a short story by Japanese master Haruki Murakami, Barn Burning. Ash is Purest White Chinese director Jia Zhangke’s new film is a story of “violent love” between a mobster and a dancer starring Zhao Tao and Liao Fan. It is a follow-up to Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart, which competed for the Palme d’Or in 2015. Asako 1 & 2 In this Japanese drama by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, a young woman meets her first love in Osaka. When he disappears without a trace, she moves on — until his perfect double shows up two years later. Les Filles du Soleil Kurdish women fighters stand at the centre of French actor-director Eva Husson’s new film. Iranian star Golshifteh Farahani plays Bahar, the leader of the Yazidi Sun Brigade battling jihadists. Shoplifters Japanese master Hirokazu Kore-eda, a longtime sweetheart of the Cannes jury, returns with a tale of a family of small-time crooks who take in a child they find on the street. Yomeddine A Coptic leper and his orphaned apprentice leave the confines of their colony for the first time and embark on a journey across Egypt to search for what is left of their families. Lazzaro Felice [caption id=“attachment_4429779” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  Alice Rohrwacher. AFP/ Theo Wargo[/caption] Rising star Italian director Alice Rohrwacher, already a prize winner at Cannes, is back with a time-travelling story which takes in the fascist 1930s. Sorry Angel The new film by Christophe Honore, the man behind the charming French musical Love Songs, is a gay love story when the AIDS epidemic was at its height. Cannes film festival will kick off from 8 May and will conclude on 19 May. (With inputs from agencies)