One week before the presentation of the official selection of the Cannes Film Festival, Thursday, April 14, Thierry Frémaux continues to watch the films sent at the last minute.
Works are rushing to the gate: more than 2,000 feature films have been submitted this year to the selection committees.
The figure, higher than the average, should however result in a tighter selection than that of last year.
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"There will be fewer films in 2022, at least, that's what I hope
," confided the general delegate of the Cannes festival, Thierry Frémaux, in an interview with the American magazine
Variety
.
The programmer's curse is bulimia, but the organizer's obsession is frugality.
The previous edition of the festival had been marked by more than 150 films programmed, all categories combined, a record.
It followed a 2020 edition of the festival first canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, then finally presented in October, in a particularly reduced format.
“
In 2021, we made an effort to invite a greater number of films
, recalled Thierry Frémaux.
The health crisis demanded it: we had to be open and generous.
This year, we will return to a normal format.
“Everything is changing”
The general delegate remains secret about the feature films selected.
Only two films have so far been confirmed on the Croisette:
Top Gun: Maverick
, the sequel to 1986's
Top Gun
, which was one of Tom Cruise's first blockbusters, and the musical biopic
Elvis
,
directed by Australian Baz Luhrmann (
Romeo+Juliette
,
Moulin Rouge
).
The official selection, meanwhile, will revolve as usual around twenty titles.
The decisive list will be refined until the last moments.
“My routine at the moment is watching movies, watching movies and watching movies
, laughed Thierry Frémaux.
At the beginning of March, we thought that we would have fewer films because of the pandemic and then everything suddenly accelerated.
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The return “to a normal edition” will not dispense with this long-awaited cinema event from celebrating its 75th anniversary with great fanfare.
This important step
“will take place in special circumstances: the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and a world that has changed and will change again”
, observed the general delegate of the festival.
Clear-headed, Thierry Frémaux has carefully followed the major changes that have been transforming the film industry in the world over the past few years.
"Everything is changing
," he says.
The way we watch movies today has evolved considerably, it affects our cinematic culture.
Attendance is falling
in many countries, part of the public prefers to stay at home and cinemas are disappearing.
In France, cinemas have indeed experienced their worst month for more than twenty years.
Despite everything, the sovereign creativity of films continues to float, according to Thierry Frémaux, above the turbulence of the film industry.
It should ensure, from May 17 to 28, a 75th edition of the Cannes Film Festival at the height of the previous one.