The History of Cannes

Read More">Cannes. The immediate image that comes to ones mind on reading this word is that of the International Film Festival hosted by the place. The name has become so synonymous with the film festival that many people aren’t even aware that Cannes is the name of a small town in France. The Cannes Film FestivalRead More

Cannes. The immediate image that comes to ones mind on reading this word is that of the International Film Festival hosted by the place. The name has become so synonymous with the film festival that many people aren’t even aware that Cannes is the name of a small town in France. The Cannes Film Festival hosted in the resort town of France has gained enormous popularity world over. Started with the aim “to encourage the development of all forms of cinematographic art and foster a spirit of collaboration between film-producing countries” by the French, the festival was started in 1932 and was held at Venice. However, World War II broke out and it was considered a failure. It was again revived in 1946 and conducted in the city of Cannes. Since then the festival has continued and flourished over the years. The film makers from all over the world today consider it to be a great honor if their films get selected for screening at this fest. The genuine appreciation of creative work at Cannes has given it a lot of “credibility” and added “leverage” to the festival.

After its re-launch in 1946, the film makers from all over the world started attending the fest that is held in the month of May every year. Films from every corner of the world started reaching Cannes making their presence felt. When so much was going on at Cannes, how can the biggest film making industry, the Indian Film Industry could stay away from the action? As a matter fact, Indian films were associated with Cannes festival from its early days. Some of the initial entries from India include films like V. Shantaram's Amar Bhoopali, Bimal Roy's Do Bigha Zamin (it won Prix Internationale in 1954), Raj Kapoor's Awara, the Kapoor-produced Boot Polish (which won a special award for child actress Baby Naaz). All these films were played on the Cannes screen from 1951 onwards. The Indian film industry thus went on to declare that India is a newly independent country which is making the kind of cinema which deserves recognition and appreciation from the world. In 1956, Satyajit Ray's masterpiece Pather Panchali was screened at Cannes. The film not only displayed the immense potential the Indian film industry held but also won the top prize at Cannes that year. After Pather Panchali however, Indian films seemed to go astray from the Cannes International Film Festival. However, some regional films like a Malayalam film Swaham (1994) and another film called Marana Simhasam (1999) happened to be the last entries into 'the Competition' at Cannes. But there wasn’t much sound about Indian Cinema at Cannes until Sanjay Leela Bansali’s Devdas was screened at Cannes in 2002. Devdas was the first ever “popular” “commercial” Indian film to be screened at Cannes. The movie was selected for “out of the competition” screening, a special category in the Cannes Film Festival that allows screening films which though didn’t make it into the official competition, they had the potential and artistic value to be screened with equal respect at the festival. Devdas was a very vibrant colorful movie which had romance, music, dance and drama backed by mammoth sets that had Indian aesthetic designs.

Over the past few years however, the number of Indian films going to Cannes for commercial purpose of finding new markets has radically increased. Also, the film makers look at the festival as an opportunity to set up collaboration projects with the film makers and technicians from other countries. From the past couple of years, Read More">Read More

Over the past few years however, the number of Indian films going to Cannes for commercial purpose of finding new markets has radically increased. Also, the film makers look at the festival as an opportunity to set up collaboration projects with the film makers and technicians from other countries. From the past couple of years, many big production houses have taken their films to Cannes for international selling and this year is going to be no different. In fact, this year will see some of the biggest films of Bollywood making their way to festival. Films like UTV’s Rang De Basanti, Jagmohan Mundra's Provoked, Salman Khan starrer Marigold, Sudipto Sen’s The Last Monk, Rajat Kapur’s Mixed Doubles and Santosh Sivan’s Navarasa will have market screenings at Cannes. Besides, Vishal Bhardawaj will take his film Omkara to Cannes. The star cast of the film which includes Saif Ali Khan, Ajay Devgan, Viveik Oberoi and Bipasha Basu will also be present at the event. And of course Karan Johar will be landing at Cannes with Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna. Preity Zinta who stars in the film will accompany Karan to Cannes in promoting the film. Besides this, 35 regional film makers have got together this year and will try to sell their films at the Cannes market. The list includes films like Rajnikanth’s Tamil blockbuster Chandramukhi and director Mani Ratnam’s Lajo.

Courtesy the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), nearly 65 Indian films will be screened at Cannes this year. Apart from that, nearly 35 new projects will be exhibited. Film and TV Guild of India, Film Federation of India, Indian Film Exporters Association and South Indian Film Exporters Association are also part of the India Pavilion set up by CII. Some of the companies and production houses that will be having representations at Cannes this year are Adlabs Films, Kaleidoscope Entertainment, AP international (biggest exporter of South Indian Movies), Sahara One Motion Pictures, EROS Multimedia, NFDC, Celluloid Dreams, iDreams Productions, IFFI and Goa Film Bazaar and Shemaroo.

Read More">Devdas set off the spark for the Indian Film Industry to associate itself with the Cannes Film festival. But this time it wasn’t just for sake of competing with other films at Cannes. One of the unique aspects of the Cannes International Film Festival is the strong platform that it offers to sell films inRead More

Devdas set off the spark for the Indian Film Industry to associate itself with the Cannes Film festival. But this time it wasn’t just for sake of competing with other films at Cannes. One of the unique aspects of the Cannes International Film Festival is the strong platform that it offers to sell films in the International market. Apart from the various structural features of the festival like competition, display of creativity and its appreciation and offering freedom of speech to the medium of films, the official program structure of the Cannes International Film Festival also includes ‘Marché du Film’, which literally means ‘the film market’. It is the largest event of its kind in the world. The main purpose of this event is trading in terms of buying and selling of the films. It is very much like a tradeshow where the producers set up their own booths and exhibit their films to the potential buyers i.e. distributors of other countries. Thus, the producers can sell their films in overseas markets. Though setting up a booth does not necessarily guarantee that the films will be purchased by international buyers, it definitely provides visibility to the films and an opportunity for film producers and distributors to expand their market. This is something that has strongly attracted Indian film makers and producers. They realize the potential that Cannes has for helping them reach places which earlier weren’t strong markets for Indian films but now seem to be good prospects. Undoubtedly, the phenomenon of globalization has also touched the Indian film industry which is now looking at making its presence felt worldwide and in turn, do better

business. In 2002, while Devdas was premiered at Cannes, another film Bhagmati -- The Queen of Fortunes which is India’s first animation film that also starred Tabu and Milind Soman along side the animated characters, had its stall set up in ‘the film market’ event. Not many Indian films were present at Cannes then.

Apparently, Read More">the visits by Bollywood celebrities to the Cannes Film Festival have always created lot of noise in the Indian and International media. The glitz and glamour at the show is one of the reasons for the event always being in the headlines. Talk about Cannes to any Indian and his top of mind recallRead More

Apparently, the visits by Bollywood celebrities to the Cannes Film Festival have always created lot of noise in the Indian and International media. The glitz and glamour at the show is one of the reasons for the event always being in the headlines. Talk about Cannes to any Indian and his top of mind recall will be Aishwarya Rai. The lady seems to be the favorite guest of the Cannes organizers. She has been to the Cannes Film Festival for four consecutive years out of which, three of her visits have been on official invitation.

Incidentally, couple of her visits to the festival created news for all wrong reasons. It’s quite interesting to take a look at Aishwarya Rai’s journey to the Cannes.
2002: Aishwarya Rai made her first visit to the Cannes Film Festival along with Shah Rukh Khan and Sanjay Leela Bansali for the promotion of her film Devdas. On her very first visit, the lady drew the crowds crazy as she walked over the red carpet. People kept cheering, waving and whistling at the Indian beauty.

2003: Ash was officially invited to Cannes to be a member of the film jury. She became the first ever Indian actor to achieve the honor. Though this was big news by itself, Ash’s visit made news for a whole different reason altogether. She was criticized by the Indian media for her dressing at Cannes, which they felt didn’t bear an Indian look, besides it seemed completely inappropriate for the occasion.

2004: The Cannes Committee seemed to have been very impressed with the cat-eyed beauty and they again invited her to be on the jury team of Cannes 2004. The actress seemed to be furious over the reaction of the Indian media for the previous year and therefore, this time decided to strike back real hard. This time she turned up in a beautiful pearl-white gown. She looked extremely gorgeous and her roman sculpture like poses kept adding to the charisma of goddess. However, to her despair, things got messed up again. This time, her attire seemed to be revealing a lot more of Aishwarya Rai than what Indians were usually used to seeing. But the lady definitely impressed the crowds and ruled at the fest. She also inaugurated the CII Indian Pavilion and also expressed her pride in promoting Indian films at an International level.

2005: This was her fourth consecutive year at Cannes. She attended the opening night of Cannes in beautiful black evening gown. Ash also delivered an opening speech that year, along with director Alexander Payne and inaugurated the festival. This time however she seemed to have been extra conscious about her attire and the black gown she wore didn’t leave any room for criticism.

Though a rollercoaster ride, Aishwarya Rai’s visits to Cannes was definitely a matter of pride for Indians. The lady was an official guest to Cannes for three consecutive years, the kind of honor which very few individuals in the world receive.

Besides Ash, some other Indian female actors have also been to Cannes and remained in limelight at the fest. Year 2004 also saw the attendance of some of the leading ladies of Bollywood at Cannes. The extremely talented Nandita Das was invited to Cannes to be a member of the jury. After Ash, Read More">she happenedRead More

Besides Ash, some other Indian female actors have also been to Cannes and remained in limelight at the fest. Year 2004 also saw the attendance of some of the leading ladies of Bollywood at Cannes. The extremely talented Nandita Das was invited to Cannes to be a member of the jury. After Ash, she happened to be the second Indian actor to get the honor. Nandita appeared at the festival in a very traditional style, dressed in a red sari, with gold jewellery and flowers in her hair. Sharmila Tagore was also present at Cannes that year as Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali was to be screened.

The same year also saw Bollywood bombshell Mallika Sherawat at Cannes rubbing shoulders with action star Jackie Chan for the promotion of their international film The Myth. The bindaas babe of Bollywood went on the red carpet in a white choli and high slit skirt showing off a lot more than what Aishwarya was accused of. But the bold female that she is, Mallika pulled it off well with the media from all over the world capturing every moment. Her dressing left no space for imagination. However, in her case, the wardrobe didn’t really create a big controversy; rather people seemed to have praised her for her act of courage on the red carpet, something which not many could have done. Surely, the Indian ladies pulled a lot of attention at the Cannes, though the reasons for attention might be differing.

Taking about Cannes, this International Film Festival today has become a big name worldwide. It might be due to the fact that Cannes is slowly being looked up as a trusted ‘brand’ when it comes to appreciation of true talents and also due to the vast ocean of opportunities that it offers for the film makers to build new contacts and sign new contracts. The festival seems to be living up the vision its founders had set. As far as India’s stand at Cannes goes, the fest very much seems to be giving the Indian Films the worldwide attention it seeks. Some of the big distributors and marketers of Indian films acknowledge that Cannes has allowed Indian films to enter the markets which earlier didn’t seem to be the domain for Indian movies, thus benefiting the Indian films largely in increasing their global reach. With the increasing participation at Cannes and growing international alliances, Cannes Film Festival is the place to be for every film maker this season.