The third and last of the Cannes film festival’s main strands to reveal its lineup has announced its selection, following the official festival on 16 April and the Critics’ Week on 20 April. The Directors’ Fortnight (AKA La Quinzaine des Réalisateurs) has picked 17 titles (though the previously announced Arabian Nights, from Portugal’s Miguel Gomes, is a six-hour trilogy).
The headline opening and closing slots are filled respectively by Philippe Garrel, with In the Shadow of Women, a study of romantic betrayal and emotional crisis involving two documentary film-makers in contemporary Paris; and Dope, the Sundance hit comedy about a nerdy African American teenager trying to pay his way to Harvard via a drug deal, directed by Rick Famuyiwa. (This marks the second high-profile selection for the Garrel family, as Philippe’s son Louis has been chosen for a special screening in the Critics’ Week for his directorial debut, Les Deux Amis.)
Other titles of note in the selection include My Golden Years, from veteran French director Arnaud Desplechin, a film described as “an excruciating and glowing quest for time and lost loves”, which was apparently turned down for the Palme d’Or competition; The Brand New Testament, a religious satire from Jaco Van Dormael, the Belgian director of Mr Nobody and Toto the Hero; Yakuza Apocalypse: The Great War of the Underworld, a gangster-vampire hybrid thriller from Takashi Miike, the prolific Japanese specialist in stylish ultraviolence; and Allende, Mi Abuelo Allende, a documentary portrait of deposed Chilean president Salvador Allende by his granddaughter Marcia Tambutti.
The starriest film of the lineup, however, is probably A Perfect Day, which features Benicio Del Toro, Tim Robbins and Olga Kurylenko in a Balkans-set drama from Spain’s Fernando León de Aranoa, shooting in English for the first time. Green Room, from US director Jeremy Saulnier, also boasts a name cast, including Anton Yelchin, Imogen Poots and Patrick Stewart, in a tale of punk rockers battling neo-Nazis.
The Directors’ Fortnight runs from 14-24 May.
Directors’ Fortnight full lineup
Opening film: In the Shadow of Women (Philippe Garrel, France)
Allende, Mi Abuelo Allende (Marcia Tambutti, Chile)
Arabian Nights (Miguel Gomes, Portugal)
The Brand New Testament (Jaco Van Dormael, Belgium)
The Cowboys (Thomas Bidegain, France)
Embrace of the Serpent (Ciro Guerra, Colombia)
Fatima (Philippe Faucon, France)
My Golden Years (Arnaud Desplechin, France)
Green Room (Jeremy Saulnier, US)
The Here After (Magnus von Horn, France)
Much Loved (Nabil Ayouch, Morocco)
Mustang (Deniz Gamze Ergüven, France)
Peace to Us in Our Dreams (Sharunas Bartas, Lithuania)
A Perfect Day (Fernando León de Aranoa, Spain)
Songs My Brothers Taught Me (Chloé Zhao, US)
Special screening: Yakuza Apocalypse: The Great War of the Underworld (Takashi Miike, Japan)
Closing film: Dope (Rick Famuyiwa, US)
