The Daily 2005

Director Hou Hsiao Hsien, enjoying his seventh visit to the Cannes Festival, was given the honor of concluded the last day of competition as the red carpet was rolled out for him at the Palais, for the official screening of Three Times. The film's stars, Shu Qi and Chang Chen, were at his side.

Hong Sangsoo answered questions from reporters about his film Tale of Cinema, which screened Thursday in competition. With him on the podium were actors Uhm Jiwon, Lee Kiwoo, and Kim Sangkyung, as well as producers Marin Karmitz and Pierre Rissient. Final cut: Hong Sangsoo on the film's title: "The Korean title of the...

Tonight, the Cannes Festival will be awarding its Festival Trophy to American actor Morgan Freeman for his career achievements. Questioned as he entered the Palais for the official screening of the Tommy Lee Jones film The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, Freeman replied that he was "quite moved" at the prospect of...

For the closing day of Cinemas of the World, the film industry in the Philippines was in the limelight. The island country presented four feature films and two shorts, representing a range of themes and styles dear to Philippine filmmakers today. Among the film screened were Dekada 70 (The Seventies) by Chito S. Rono, the...

Nine of the 18 directors participating in the Atelier du Festival at the Cannes Festival this year were able to conclude financing on their next feature films, announced Pierre Viot, President of the Cinefondation. The Festival initiated this project in order to accompany upcoming talented filmmakers from the four corners of...

The Death of Mr. Lazarescu from Romanian director Cristi Puiu was awarded the Un Certain Regard-Fondation GAN Prize, bestowed by the Jury headed by American director Alexander Payne. This sort of road-movie in an ambulance follows the nighttime trip of 63-year-old Mr. Lazarescu, who is sick and living alone in an apartment...

The in-competition screening of The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada brought the film's cast and crew together for the triumphant Cannes red-carpet moment. Actor-director Tommy Lee Jones waved to the crowd, along with actors Barry Pepper, Julio Cesar Cedillo, and January Jones. Morgan Freeman, who was awarded a Festival...

It is Michael Haneke's Hidden that won over both the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) and the Ecumenical Jury, two non official Festival prizes awarded each year at the Cannes Festival. Hidden, a psychological thriller about guilt, is portrayed by actors Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche, and is one of...

As part of its Documentaries on Filmmaking program, the Official Selection and Critics' Week join together to present Jean-Luc Godard's Moments choisis des Histoire(s) de Cinéma. This film, described by the director as being "full of life," is a philosophical and poetic meditation on the traces, the sources, and the...

Hou Hsiao Hsien gave an exclusive Cannes press conference, providing reporters with more background on his film Three Times, to be screened today in competition. He was accompanied by the film's two stars, Shu Qi and Chang Chen. Here are the highlights: Hou Hsiao Hsien on memories: "The best moments we've experienced...

American actress Sharon Stone, in Cannes as one of the stars of Broken Flowers, this year's Jim Jarmusch offering, was decorated with the insignia of an Officier des Arts et Lettres by Cannes Festival President Gilles Jacob, acting under the auspices of the French Minister of Culture and Communication Renaud Donnedieu de...

Tonight at 9:30 PM, the open-air screening at the Cinéma de la Plage will feature a new copy of The Last Waltz by Martin Scorsese. Shot in 1976, this documentary shows the last San Francisco appearance of The Band, a legendary group from the 1960s and 70s. The event drew such famous guest musicians as Van Morrison, Bob...

Winding up the competition presentations at this 58th edition of the Cannes Festival, Tommy Lee Jones' The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada screens today, but first a few sound bites from the press conference, which was attended by director-actor Tommy Lee Jones, screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga, producers Michael Fitzgerald...

The Un Certain Regard screenings end today with the presentation of the last film in the competition selection, Havana Blues by Benito Zambrano. This is the Spanish director's second feature-length film, after Solas (1999). It is a look back at the twelve years he spent in Cuba, the country where he received his degree in...

Three Times marks Taiwanese filmmaker Hou Hsiao Hsien's sixth bid for the Cannes Palme d'Or. In 1993, he was awarded the Jury Prize for The Puppetmaster; his Good Men, Good Women was chosen for screening in the Official Selection in 1995, as were Goodbye, South Goodbye (1996), Flowers of Shanghai (1998), and Millenium Mambo...

Fourteen years after coming to Cannes to present Yumeji in Un Certain Regard, Japanese director Seijun Suzuki is back with a musical: Operetta Tanukigoten (Princess Raccoon), to be screened out of competition. It features actress Zhang Ziyi, who played a supporting role in 2046 and starred in House of Flying Daggers. ...

Today, Moroccan director Laïla Marrakchi is presenting Marock in the Un Certain Regard section. Eligible for the Caméra d'Or, the film is an autobiographical meditation on the director's own late teen years, the age when the insouciance of adolescence gives way to the first anxieties of adulthood. Casablanca:...

Gilles Jacob and Pierre Viot created the Cinéfondation in 1998 with the intent of sniffing out upcoming talent. This official selection of movies from film schools has been presented each year at the Festival ever since. On the program, 18 films from Asia, Europe, North America and Australia were selected from among the...

The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, one of the last two films to be screened in competition (the other being Three Times by Hou Hsiao Hsien), is the second film Tommy Lee Jones has directed, ten years after the 1995 television film The Good Old Boys. The actor-director plays the role of Pete Perkins, foreman of a Texas...

The competition selection brought German director Wim Wenders to the Croisette with Don't Come Knocking, the third film in competition to deal with the subject of paternity, following Broken Flowers from Jim Jarmusch and The Child from brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne. Sam Shepard plays an aging western actor who sets out...