Directors’ Week at Cannes is launching a new People’s Choice Award for its next edition, which will be held in conjunction with the main festival from May 15 to 26.
The parallel section said the award, which comes with a cash prize of 7,500 euros ($8,100), is in keeping with the spirit of the event, which has always been open to members of the public alongside film professionals since its launch in 1969.
This will be the first audience award to be presented at the Cannes Film Festival, through the official selection and the parallel sections of the Directors’ Week, the Critics’ Week, and the Acid.
“Every year, in addition to professionals and other approved guests, Fortnite opens its doors to thousands of film fans from around the world, in order to share its selections in a welcoming atmosphere, giving filmmakers the opportunity to meet the first audiences for their films.”, and an opportunity for fans to participate in questions And answers with the film teams,” according to a statement from “Directors’ Fortnight.”
He added: “It is this interactive dimension that we would like to celebrate today by inviting our audience to vote: this will also be the first audience award in the history of the Cannes Film Festival.”
Directors’ Weekly said that the new award would be linked to the legacy of Chantal Akerman and that the cash award was supported by the Chantal Akerman Foundation.
The section notes that the late director’s “pioneering, eclectic and fiercely independent vision may serve as a compass” for the new award.
Pioneering Belgian director Akerman, who died aged 65 in 2015, had close ties to Fortnight magazine.
Her breakthrough film Jeanne Dielman, 23 Rue Commerce – 1080 Brusselsnow considered a classic feature film of the 20th century, had its world premiere at the department in 1975.
The Directors’ Weekly also welcomed subsequent works The golden eighties (1986), south (1999), The prisoner (2000) and Tombe de Nuit in Shanghai (2007), a clip from her mobile film State of the World with Aisha Abraham and Wang Ping.