Italy with a dry mouth at the 74th Cannes Film Festival. The jury chaired by Spike Lee did not award Nanni Moretti’s ‘Three floors’. The only tricolor ‘flash’, the Palme d’Or of honor to Marco Bellocchio, delivered by Paolo Sorrentino in the midst of a standing ovation. The 81-year-old director thanked, moved, speaking in Italian: “I want to share the award with my extended family.”
«I have succeeded in things – he added – they have always had two concepts: imagination and courage, are two obligatory things in our profession. A director must have courage ».
The French film ‘Titane’ by Julia Ducournau triumphed. She is the second female director to win the Festival’s highest award. The victory of the Palme d’Or was announced, by mistake, by Spike Lee at the beginning of the ceremony, much earlier than expected, and then confirmed at the end, thus reversing the tradition. At the announcement of the award at the end, the director apologized saying “this is my second chance”, but again risking to spoil the moment and not wait for the arrival of Sharon Stone who presented the award. Stopped in time, Spike Lee avoided the second mistake and announced with the actress, definitively, the victory.
Best actor is the American Caleb Landry Jones for ‘Nitram’ by Justin Kurzel, the Norwegian Renate Reinsve for ‘The Worst person in the world‘ by Joachim Trier is best actress. The best director is Leos Carax for ‘Annette’. The jury’s prize went ex aequo to the films ‘Haberech’ by Nadav Lapid and ‘Memoria’ by Apitchapong Weerasethakul. The Best Screenplay Award goes to Hamaguchi Ryusuke and Takamasa Oe for ‘Drive my car’. Ex aequo also for the Grand Prix to Asghar Farhadi for ‘Ghahraman’ and Juho Kuosmanen for ‘Hytti n ° 6’. The Golden Chamber for Best First Feature goes to ‘Murina’ by Croatian Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic, who was absent from the ceremony after giving birth on Friday. Tang Yi’s Tia Xia Wu Ya wins, while special mention goes to Jasmin Tenucci’s ‘Céu de agosto’.