The Spanish VÃctor Erice will be present at the 76th edition of the Cannes Film Festival with Cerrar los ojos, his new film after 30 years away from the commercial exhibition circuit, as Thierry Fremaux, artistic director of the contest, announced yesterday. during the press conference to announce this year’s schedule, from May 16 to 27. The director of El sur, with which he competed four decades ago for the Palme d’Or, and El sol del membrillo, (1992) with which he won the jury prize and the Fipresci award, will participate this time in the section Cannes Premieres
Written by Erice and with Michel Gaztambide, the film tells the story of a disappearance and revolves around the themes of identity and memory. Last year As bestas, by Rodrigo Sorogoyen and a big winner of the Goya awards, had its official premiere on the Croisette in the same section, where it was received with a standing ovation.
Erice’s will be the only Spanish film in a competition that will also premiere Pedro Almodóvar’s gay western, as the festival organization announced on Wednesday. The short film Extraña forma de vida, filmed less than a year ago in Almeria in the settings of spaghetti westerns, narrates the adventure between two cowboys starring Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal. This is the second experience in English by the Mancheque director after La voz humana (2020).
In the absence of any further additions that will be announced next week, these two titles will be the representation of Spanish cinema in the festival’s official programming. In addition, at the Cannes Film Market, which is held in parallel, Spain is the guest of honor. Fremaux assured that Almodovar’s short is “incredible” and leaves you thinking, and that having Erice back as director is a “gift”.
Heavyweights of auteur cinema will be part of an official section of the competition that will be evaluated by a jury chaired by the Swede Ruben Östlund, winner of the Palme d’Or in 2022 for The Triangle of Tristeza. Veteran names will compete for the Palme d’Or such as Wes Anderson (Asteroid City), Aki Kaurismaki (Fallen leaves), the Japanese Hirokazu Kore-eda, who returns to France a year later with Monster, the Italian Nanni Moretti (The Sun del futuro), the British Ken Loach (The Old Oak), Todd Haynes (May December), Marco Bellocchio (Rapito) and Wim Wenders (Perfect Days), who will be honored precisely next week at the BCN Film Fest.
Authors such as Jonathan Glazer with The zone of interest, Kaouther Ben Hania with Four daughters, Jessica Hausner with Club zero, Alice Rohrwacher with La chimera and Justine Triet with Anatomie d’une chute will also fight for the prize.
The Cannes Film Festival will raise the curtain with Jeanne du Barry, from the French Maïwenn, which marks the return of Johnny Depp to the big screen after his media trial. The film, surrounded by controversy due to the alleged assault of the French director on Edwy Plenel, editor-in-chief of Mediapart, will be shown out of competition. Like Martin Scorsese’s much-anticipated thriller, Killers of the flower moon, with Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, and the fifth edition of the Indiana Jones adventures, starring an octogenarian Harrison Ford who returns to the skin of the intrepid archaeologist
