Sun bronzed and glamourous on the outside many of the big names in film are sweating underneath it all at the Cannes Film Festival, and it’s not just because of the May warmth of the French Riviera. This is one of the most influential of the International Film Festivals and early on the calendar, and many big decisions about which films will be showing in your local cinema will be made over the two weeks of the event.

As well as twenty films nominated for the main competition competing for the Palm d’Or - now considered a very valuable addition to the front of a DVD case - a selection of Cannes classics, twenty original and culturally different films, a season of shorts and short works by major film schools, a selection of the best in world cinema and a run of ‘out of competition’ screenings flood the town with moving images. And names big and small come to take part and grace red carpets, running the gauntlet of a huge press contingent. Sunny days are packed with back to back interview calls and photo shoots and companies publicise new releases and evenings are filled with glamour.

But it’s not inaccessible to the general public. There are so many events at the festival, both screening and lectures and symposiums that there are plenty of tickets on sale to less star studded audiences as long as you book your accommodation well enough in advance, and as well as it being a way to dip your toe into the glamour of the film industry it’s also a pretty nice time and place to take a holiday, assuming of course you don’t attempt to actually stay in Cannes.

Cannes Festival Website.

Written by  Kat Mackintosh.

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