35 top-class directors celebrate diamond anniversary
The landscape of world cinema is set for a makeover at the 60th Cannes International Film Festival (May 16-27, 2007). To mark the event’s diamond anniversary, an ensemble film has been made by 35 of the world’s most famous directors, 16 of which have won the Golden Palm, while others have won several awards and honours at Cannes over the years.
Christened Chacun son cinéma, the film – made up of three-minute shorts on a theme of each director’s choice, related to "their current state of mind inspired by cinema" – will be screened on May 20 during the festival and broadcast live the same evening on pay-TV channel Canal +.
Despite laments by Gilles Jacob over the film’s “modest budget”, the filmmakers were willing to participate in what the Cannes festival president has described as a desire "to celebrate 60 years of creativity through creativity".
European directors will dominate with 14 representatives: Roman Polanski (Poland); Ken Loach (UK); Nanni Moretti (Italy); Wim Wenders (Germany); Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (Belgium); Lars Von Trier and Bille August (Denmark); Manoel De Oliveira (Portugal); Theo Angelopoulos (Greece); Aki Kaurismaki (Finland), and Olivier Assayas, Claude Lelouch and Raymond Depardon (France).
Other names on the prestigious list of 35 directors from five continents and 25 countries include Ethan and Joel Coen, Gus Van Sant and Michael Cimino (US); David Cronenberg and Atom Egoyan (Canada); Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu (Mexico); Walter Salles (Brazil); Raoul Ruiz (Chile); Jane Campion (Australia); Elia Suleiman (Palestine); Amos Gitai (Israel); Abbas Kiarostami (Iran); Hou Hsiao Hsien and Malaysian-born Tsai Ming liang (Taiwan); Takeshi Kitano (Japan); Zhang Yimou, Chen Kaige and Wong Kar Wai (China); Andrei Konchalovsky (Russia), and Youssef Chahine (Egypt).
The dream team has been described by Jacob as a "group of creators, all widely known, representing both their country and a proud conception of cinema...poets who capture a fragment of the world and transfigure it."
(Translated from French)
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