Quebec director Xavier Dolan is officially in the race to win a Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for his film Juste la fin du monde.
It’s the second time a movie by Dolan has been selected for the official competition by the Cannes jury. Mommy was a contender in 2014 and earned the jury prize.
Juste la fin du monde is the sixth and most recently completed film from the 27-year-old writer-director and Cannes veteran.
“I don’t want to say what the key to my success is – because I don’t know if it will always work – but the thing that I do is that I honestly, constantly work,” said Dolan in a phone interview from London after the news was announced early Thursday. He’s in London scouting locations for his latest project, The Death and Life of John F. Donovan.
“When I look back at the past seven years, running from my eyes is a scenery of work, work, work – like the Rihanna song. It’s been relentless work, but it’s always been passionate. I also know that I’ve been doing things with the same integrity and the same pleasure all these years.”
For Juste la fin du monde, Dolan adapted and directed the Jean-Luc Lagarce play of the same name. It tells the story of a young writer’s return to his home town after an absence of 12 years to announce his impending death. The film stars Marion Cotillard (La Vie en Rose), Léa Seydoux (Spectre, The Grand Budapest Hotel), Vincent Cassel (Black Swan), Nathalie Baye (Laurence Anyways) and Gaspard Ulliel (Saint Laurent, Hannibal Rising). It was shot in Montreal and Laval and is expected to hit screens in Quebec in September.
The screening of the film in official competition at the 69th annual Cannes festival, which runs from May 11 to 22, will mark its official launch.
Xavier Dolan on the set of Juste la fin du monde, with Marion Cotillard (centre right) and cast.
Dolan’s connection to Cannes runs deep. He was named to the jury at the 2015 Cannes film fest, but did not have a film in or out of competition. He has premièred four of his last five films at the festival, including his first feature film, J’ai tué ma mère, in 2009 and Mommy. In between, Les Amours imaginaires (Heartbeats) and Laurence Anyways received enthusiastic receptions when selected for Cannes’ Un Certain Regard program.
Cannes festival general delegate Thierry Fremaux, left, and president Pierre Lescure at a press conference in Paris Thursday to unveil the 20 movies in official competition.
In total, 20 films from 28 countries made the cut to compete for the prestigious Palme d’Or, including:
Sean Penn’s The Last Face, about aid workers in Liberia who fall in love (starring Charlize Theron and Javier Bardem).
Jeff Nichols’ Loving, about an interracial couple sentenced to prison in the U.S. in the 1950s for their marriage.
Ken Loach’s I, Daniel Blake, about a man struggling with a devastating welfare bureaucracy.
Pedro Almodovar’s Julieta, about a woman coping with the loss of her husband only to find her daughter has run away.
Cannes film festival general delegate Thierry Fremaux, left, and president Pierre Lescure at a press conference Thursday in Paris to unveil the 20 movies in official competition.
As previously announced, Woody Allen’s latest film, Cafe Society, will have its red carpet première when it opens the festival on May 11 – though is not in official competition. Starring Kristen Stewart, Jesse Eisenberg, with Blake Lively, Parker Posey and Steve Carell as part of the cast, the movie is set in Hollywood in the 1930s.
Other big names coming to the festival this year – out of competition but screening their latest – include Steven Spielberg, with The BFG, and Jodie Foster with Money Monster.
Mad Max director George Miller is heading the jury that will select the Palme d’Or and other prizes.
