Cannes 2007: World's biggest film fest kicks off

The 60th anniversary of the World's most prestigious film festival Cannes kicked off with Chinese director Wong Kar Wai's 'My Blueberry Nights' last Wednesday May 16.

The opening movie kicks off 11 hectic days of networking, deal making and partying among thousands of people from across the industry who descend on Cannes each year.

To emphasise this 60th anniversary, the Festival has imagined a symbolic couple: an alliance of wisdom with modernity, experience with grace. Manoel de Oliveira, the only director to have made films ever since the silent era, and princess Shu-Qi, symbol of our dreams of the Orient, declared the 60th Festival open.

It is one of 22 competition films, but hundreds more, including major Hollywood productions, are screened and touted, luring the likes of Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin Scorsese and Sharon Stone to France's southern coast. Selectors chose no less than five U.S. productions in the main competition, although two have already been released in their home country to a cool reception. Portraits of life in Iran, Romania, Ukraine, Austria, Mexico, Turkey and Israel also feature in what critics expect to be a vintage lineup. As ever, out-of-competition films threaten to steal the limelight, with Hollywood sequel Ocean's 13, starring Clooney and Pitt, premiering in Cannes, and Jolie promoting A Mighty Heart based on the story of slain reporter Daniel Pearl.

But there are no genuine blockbusters launched at the festival this year, unlike 2005's Star Wars sequel and 2006's The Da Vinci Code, which went on to gross $758 million at the worldwide box office despite a critical mauling in Cannes.

There are also fewer political films this year, although Michael Moore's documentary SiCKO about the U.S. healthcare system is likely to cause a stir, just as his anti-Bush polemic Fahrenheit 9/11 did when it won the 2004 Palme d'Or.

Heartthrob DiCaprio is in town with 11th Hour, an environmental documentary that is the latest product of Hollywood's growing concern over global warming. And although no British films appear in the main competition this year, some of its biggest music acts are set to light up the silver screen.

Under its President, Stephen Frears this year's Jury composed of Maggie Cheung, Toni Collette, Maria De Medeiros, Sarah Polley, Marco Bellocchio, Orhan Pamuk, Michel Piccoli, and Abderrahmane Sissako, meets in Cannes for the first time this evening for a working session.

Cannes and Lanka

Cannes has some connection to the Sri Lankan film industry as well. Lester James Peiris' ground breaking film which opened a new era in Sri Lankan cinema was screened at the Cannes festival when it was just ten years old.

Having visited on several occasions and being a member of 1992 Jury, Dr. Peiris was the most honoured Sri Lankan filmmaker in Cannes. His two other films 'Beddegama' (The Village in the Jungle) and 'Kaliyugaya' (The Age of Kali) were invited to be screened in the section, Director's Fortnight.

The other Sri Lankan to be awarded at the Cannes is young filmmaker Vimukthi Jayasundara. Vimukthi won his prestigious Camera d' Or (Golden Camera) awarded for the Best Director for the first feature film for his 'The Forsaken Land' (Sulanga Enathuru) at the 58th International Cannes Film Festival in 2005.