Following on from preview screenings organised by the British Council in June for Festival Directors Cameron Bailey and Piers Handling, over 25 British films, including co-productions, were selected for this year's festival.
The strong line up of British films made its mark, with Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire winning the Cadillac People’s Choice Award and Steve McQueen’s Hunger, the winner of the prestigious Camera d’Or at Cannes, taking the Diesel Discovery Award.
The programme also included Cannes favourites Of Time And The City and Better Things which were both selected for the Cannes Critics' Week earlier this year. Also featuring was the world premiere of the UK/New Zealand co-production Dean Spangley directed by Toa Fraser and starring Peter O'Toole, Sam Neill and Bryan Brown and the UK/Canada co-production Stone of Destiny which wasthe closing film of the festival.
As part of 'Dialogues: Talking with Pictures' Terence Davies presented his 1984 feature The Terence Davies Trilogy. Other familiar names at the festival were Mike Leigh, Michael Winterbottom, Guy Richie, and Richard Eyre, whilst relative newcomer Saul Dibb screened his second feature, the eagerly anticipated The Duchess. Non-fiction took it’s place in the line-up, with a visual history of the 1968 student protests, an exploration of modern China’s zeitgeist and a ‘popumentary’.
The full list of British films (including co-productions) shown:
Duane Hopkins (UK) Weijun Chen (UK/The Netherlands/Denmark) Richard Parry (UK) Toa Fraser (UK/New Zealand) Saul Dibb (UK/France/Italy) Stephan Elliott (UK) John Latham (UK) Kari Skogland (UK/Canada) Rosalind Nashishibi and Lucy Skaer (UK) Michael Winterbottom (UK) Vicente Amorim (UK/Germany) Mike Leigh (UK) Steve McQueen (UK) John Crowley (UK) Richard Linklater UK) Terence Davies (UK) Richard Eyre (UK/USA) Guy Ritchie (UK) Gabor Csupo (UK/Hungary/France) Anthony Fabian (UK/South Africa) Danny Boyle (UK) Jamie Jay Johnson (UK) Charles Martin Smith (UK/Canada) Terence Davies (UK) Paul Cronin (UK/USA) Fabrice du Welz (UK/France/Belgium)
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