Movie stars set course for Cannes Film Festival

The official poster for The Cannes Film Festival which celebrates its 65th anniversary this year Wednesday will see art house directors and Hollywood royalty, converge on the French Riviera for two weeks as the Cannes Film Festival rolls out the red carpet for the giants of the movie industry. David Cronenberg, Ken Loach and Michael Haneke, are among 22 international filmmakers vying for the Palme d’Or award at the 65th anniversary edition of the legendary film festival. The festival will run from May 16 to 27.
The 2012 lineup is full of A-listers, such as Nicole Kidman, Marion Cotillard, Jessica Chastain, Kylie Minogue, Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Brad Pitt.
“Cannes is still the place to be if you’re in the movie world,” enthused the festival’s general delegate Thierry Fremaux, who cherry-picked the official selection - the Palme d’Or contenders plus 17 films in the new talent section “Un Certain Regard” - from almost 1,800 entries.
Palme d’Or-winner Nanni Moretti of Italy heads up the nine-strong jury which also includes actor Ewan McGregor and fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier, while “Un Certain Regard” is chaired by British actor-director Tim Roth. US director Wes Anderson will strike a joyous keynote with the opening film Moonrise Kingdom, a preteen elopement story whose star-packed cast includes Bruce Willis as a small-town cop.
American stories dominate throughout the lineup, though sometimes told by foreign directors, with films billed as bridging the gap between studio blockbusters and offbeat indie flicks.
Fremaux added: “There used to be a culture of mainstream auteur cinema, of grown-up auteur cinema, that’s the cinema we should be seeing again this year.”
Two US films are in the running for the Cannes Gold.  The first, Lee Daniels’ The Paperboy, tells the tale of a reporter investigating a death row case. The second is by the director Jeff Nichols, titled Mud, which tells the tale of two teenage boys and a fugitive. Canadian director, Cronenberg, debuts his film Cosmopolis, which is adapted from Don DeLillo’s novel and stars Robert Pattinson as a billionaire asset manager journeying through the city in a stretch limo.
In a light hearted twist to the seriousness of the nominations, Cronenberg’s son Brandon,will be in Cannes too, showing his debut Antiviral in “Un Certain Regard.”
Australian directors John Hillcoat and Andrew Dominik, bring two US set works to Cannes,bootlegging drama Lawless and mobster flick Killing Them Softly. The Brazilian, Walter Salles, has adapted Jack Kerouac’s cult novel On the Road. One of the buzz-making films being screened out of competition is Philip Kaufman’s Hemingway and Gellhorn, with Kidman playing the writer’s war reporter third wife opposite Clive Owen.