Salles, Kaufman, Wenders and Eastwood battle it out at Cannes 61

cannes61.jpgThe films selected for the official competition at the 61st edition of the Cannes Film Festival (May 14-25) were unveiled at midday today in Paris.  They included the directorial debut of Charlie Kaufman, as well as the latest film from two-times Palme D'Or winners the brothers Dardenne. No British films were featured, but the Hollywood friendly out of competition slot includes both the world premiere of Indiana Jones IV and Kung Fu Panda - as well as the latest pictures from Woody Allen and Steven Soderbergh - whose hotly anticipated Che Guevara double bill (The Argentine & Guerilla) staring Benicio del Torro missed out on the competition because of delays in editing. Sean Penn heads the Jury.

Competition

 "24 City," China, Jia Zhangke

"Adoratin," Canada, Atom Egoyan
"Changeling," U.S., Clint Eastwood
"Che," Spain, Steven Soderbergh
"Un Conte de noel," France, Arnaud Desplechin
"Daydreams," Turkey, Nuri Bilge Ceylan
"Delta," Hungary, Kornel Mundruczo
"Il Divo," Paolo Sorrentino, Italy
"Gomorra," Italy, Matteo Garrone
"La Frontiere de l'aube," France, Philippe Garrel
"Leonera," Argentina, Pablo Trapero
"Linha de Passe," Brazil, Walter Salles, Daniela Thomas
"La mujer sin cabeza," Argentina, Lucrecia Martel
"My Magic," Singapore, Eric Khoo
"The Palermo Shooting," Germany, Wim Wenders
"Serbis," Philippines, Brillante Mendoza
"The Silence of Lorna," Belgium, Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
"Synecdoche, New York," U.S., Charlie Kaufman
"Waltz With Bashir," Israel, Ari Folman

OUT OF COMPETITION

"Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," U.S., Steven Spielberg
"Kung Fu Panda,"
U.S., Mark Osborne, John Stevenson
"The Good, the Bad, the Weird," South Korea, Kim Jee-woon
"Vicky Cristina Barcelona," U.S., Spain, Woody Allen

MIDNIGHT SCREENINGS

“Maradona,” Spain-France, Emir Kusturica
“Surveillance,” U.S., Jennifer Lynch
“The Chaser,” South Korea, Na Hong-jin

SPECIAL SCREENNGS   

“Ashes of Time Redux,” Hong Kong, Wong Kar-wai
“Of Time and the City,” U.K., Terence Davies
"Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired," U.S.-U.K., Marina Zenovich
"Sangue Pazzo" (Crazy Blood), Italy-France, Marco Tullio Giordana

SCREENING OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE JURY

“The Third Wave,” U.S., Alison Thompson

UN CERTAIN REGARD

“A festa da menina morta,” Brazil, Matheus Nachtergaele
“Afterschool,” Antonio Campos
“De Ofrivilliga,” Sweden, Ruben Ostlund
“Je veux voir,” France, Joana Hadjithomas, Khalil Joreige
“Johnny Mad Dog,” France, Jean-Stephane Sauvaire
“La vie moderne (profiles paysans)”, France, Raymond Depardon
“Los Bastardos,” Mexico, Amat Escalante
“Milh handha al-bahr,” (Salt of This Sea), Palestine, Annemarie Jacir
“O’ Horten,” Norway-Germany, Bent Hamer
“Soi Cowboy,” Thomas Clay
“Tin Che,” (Parking), Chung Mong-Hong
"Tokyo!," France, Japan, Bong Joon-ho, Michel Gondry, Leos Carax
"Tokyo Sonata," Japan, Kiyoshi Kurosawa
“Tulpan,” Germany, Sergey Dvortsevoy
"Tyson," U.S., James Toback
“Versailles,” France, Pierre Schoeller
“Wendy and Lucy,” U.S., Kelly Reichardt
“Wolke 9” (Cloud Nine), Germany, Andreas Dresen
“Yi ban haishui, yi ban huoyan,” Fendou Liu