2018 Cannes Critics’ Week: Paul Dano’s Directorial Debut; Competition Films 57% Female-Directed

Erik Anderson April 16, 2018

Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhaal star in Paul Dano’s **Wildlife**

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The 57th Cannes Critics’ Week was announced today and Paul Dano’s directorial debut, Wildlife, starring Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhaal will open the selection, which runs May 9-17. The film debuted at Sundance this January and is based on the novel by Richard Ford. It’s set for US distribution by IFC Films.

The Closing film will be Guy, the second feature by Alex Lutz. Of the seven films in competition, four are directed by women and all come from European countries.

Joachim Trier will preside over the jury and by joined actress and director Chloë Sevigny, BPM (Beats Per Minute) star Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, Vienna film festival director Eva Sangiorgi and French culture journalist Augustin Trapenard.

Competition titles

(Descriptions supplied by festival)

Fuga (Fugue) The second feature by Polish director Agnieszka Smoczynska, who debuted with The Lure, tells the story of a woman’s impossible return to her family life, infusing this psychological thriller with fantasy.

Kona Fer í Stríð (Woman At War) The second film of Icelandic director Benedikt Erlingsson tells the story of a female hero who fights a war on her own to protect an endangered planet.

Sauvage, Camille Vidal-Naquet’s first French film, follows the fate of a young man looking for love in the world of male prostitution. Félix Maritaud, whom the public discovered in BPM (Beats Per Minute), stars.

In comedy Diamantino, their first Portuguese feature film, Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt imagine a famous football player everybody lusts after.

In her first film, Chris the Swiss, Swiss director Anja Kofmel offers an original blend of documentary and animation. She investigates the story of her cousin, who was found assassinated in the midst of the war in Yugoslavia.

Indian director Rohena Gera debuts with romantic comedy Sir, which describes the budding relationship between a young, open-minded bourgeois young man and his housekeeper who is seeking emancipation, played by Tillotama Shome.

Egy Nap (One Day), the first feature film by Hungarian director Zsofia Szilagyi, explores the life of a couple living under the yoke of routine.

Critics Week 2018 full line-up

OPENING FILM

Wildlife, Paul Dano

CLOSING FILM

Guy, Alex Lutz

FEATURE FILMS IN COMPETITION

Chris The Swiss, Anja Kofmel
Diamantino, Gabriel Abrantes & Daniel Schmidt
Egy Nap (One Day), Zsófia Szilágyi
Fuga (Fugue), Agnieszka Smoczyńska
Kona Fer Í Stríð (Woman At War), Benedikt Erlingsson
Sauvage, Camille Vidal-Naquet
Sir, Rohena Gera

FEATURE FILMS SPECIAL SCREENINGS

Nos Batailles (Our Struggles), Guillaume Senez
Shéhérazade, Jean-Bernard Marlin

SHORT FILMS SPECIAL SCREENINGS

La Chute (The Fall), Boris Labbé
Third Kind, Yorgos Zois
Ultra Pulpe (Apocalypse After), Bertrand Mandico

SHORT FILMS IN COMPETITION

Amor, Avenidas Novas, Duarte Coimbra
Ektoras Malo : I Teleftea Mera Tis Chronias (Hector Malo – The Last Day Of The Year), Jacqueline Lentzou
Mo-Bum-Shi-Min (Exemplary Citizen), Kim Cheol-Hwi
Pauline Asservie (Pauline, Enslaved), Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet
La Persistente, Camille Lugan
Rapaz (Raptor), Felipe Gálvez
Schächer, Flurin Giger
Tiikeri (The Tiger), Mikko Myllyahti
Un Jour De Mariage (A Wedding Day), Elias Belkeddar
Ya Normalniy, Michael Borodin

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.