but catching the odd glimpse of a hollywood star on the famous red carpet announces to the world that cinema is back. or at least it hopes it is. matt damon there for the action thriller stillwater, which gets a cinema release in august, said cannes had reminded him of what a big screen experience could feel like. i m really glad that we are here this year. after watching things on television for, you know, two years just about, to be in a room with a thousand other people, i never would have appreciated it in that way had we notjust gone through what we went through. you sound very american right now. good, iam. damon plays a construction worker from oklahoma, bill baker, whose daughter is in prison in france for murder. the french connection does not end there. it was partly filmed in the south of france and is a european co production with french writers and crew. eight, seven. faster. in competition, the florida project sean baker went
different kinds of films, so i feel like there s a wave of films now coming from a place, maybe that s really personal and with a rawness and realness and maybe a desperate need to communicate something and we can t really take things for granted as we used to do. we can t really take things for granted as we used to do. no one is taking for granted either that the days of the film spectaculars only hollywood can afford to put on will return to cannes even next year. but at least this year a start was made. cannes made a big effort to go green this year to reduce the festival s carbon footprint and introduce a new section of the films devoted to climate change and the environment. this new section brought forth a wave of compelling cinema. when the red carpet leading up to the palais des festivals was unrolled this year,
to texas with red rocket, the story of an ex adult film star. and also in competition, sean penn s flag day, with the director also taking on the leading role ofjohn vogel, a misfit with grandiose dreams and his relationship with his daughter with his daughter, jennifer, played by penn s daughter, dylan. it is an art film, i think it takes its time and ijust think cannes is a perfect place for a movie like that. i feel like people. the audience here can connect to that movie, respects this kind of movie making. but after the 0scar win of parasite, a us audience is now far more open to less mainstreamed subtitled stories. prometheus actress noomi rapace stars in lamb, an icelandic thriller with a much talked about twist that was immediately slapped up for release in the united states. i definitely think we will see
a big profile here at cannes. veteran masters like mike lee and ken loach were festival regulars, but this year, no british film earned a slot in the coveted competition. but there were plenty of directors represented elsewhere in the festival. a new group moved into the foreground here at cannes, as emma jones reports. cow, by director andrea arnold, an immersive documentary about the life cycle of cows and their exploitation, was part of this year s decidedly female gaze from the british at cannes this year. arnold, who made the feature film american honey, was also head of the un certain regard jury. how is your film? i m not calling it that any longer. the second part ofjoanna hogg s the souvenir also premiered in the directors fortnight section of cannes, which continues her semiautobiographical coming of age story aboutjulie, a young film director, played by honor swinton byrne in herfirst acting role.
from the opening night picture, the operatic musical annette, to director paul verhoeven s benedetta, a love story between two 17th century nuns, to a hero, the story of a man who gets himself into a quandary trying to find a way to pay off a debt, from oscar winning iranian film maker asghar farhadi. cannes offered the world a whole slate of new films to fire up the international movie industry ecosystem brought to a halt by covid. the whole distribution mechanism is in flux and it feels like cannes is sort of part of the whole thing sputtering to life, and we don t know where it is going to end up. how many theatres are going to open up? how many films will actually be shown in theatres?