Fish Tank
The likes of Ang Lee, Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino may all have movies showing at the Cannes Festival but this weekend belonged to just one young girl... Katie Jarvis.
The Essex girl, who had no acting experience, was discovered on a train platform when she was having a row with her boyfriend.
But Andrea Arnold, the filmmaker behind Red Road, took a chance on the teenager and cast her in her new movie Fish Tank, which is currently the toast of the film festival.
The movie follows fifteen year old Mia whose life is turned upside down when her mum brings home a new boyfriend, and it's a performance that could see her scoop Best Actress when the festival closes at the weekend.
However Jarvis was unable to join the rest of the cast and director on the red carpet for her moment in the spotlight after giving birth to her daughter just last week.
This weekend also saw Ang Lee premiere his first movie since Lust, Caution in the form of Taking Woodstock, adaptation of an adaptation of Elliot Tiber's memoir.
Despite the movie's good cast of Emile Hirsch, Liev Schreiber, Imelda Staunton, Jeffrey Dean Morgan the film faced a tough time at the hands of the critics.
And while the movie is a solid one from the filmmaker it's one that doesn't rank alongside the likes of Brokeback Mountain and Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.
French film has quite a strong presence in the In Competition category this and it's Une Prophet that caused quite a stir early Saturday morning when it was first screened.
Directed by Jacques Audiard the movie follows Malik El Djebena, who is sentenced to six years in prison. Arriving at the jail entirely alone, he appears younger and more fragile than the other convicts.
He is 19 years old. Cornered by the leader of the Corsican gang who rules the prison, he is given a number of "missions" to carry out, toughening him up and gaining the gang leader’s confidence in the process.
Mother is another film that is also grabbing the attention of audiences and critics but isn't in the In Competition category. Directed by Bong Joon-ho from South Korea, the Asian film industry is once again here is force and delivering some powerful stuff, the film follows a mother who has been widowed for many years.
She lives with her twenty eight year old son who is a quiet and shy young man but after the murder of a woman he becomes the prime suspect.
Over the next week Tarantino and Brad Pitt will sweep into Cannes for the screening of their new movie Inglorious Basterds and the screening of Heath Ledger's final movie The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus will also take place.
FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw
Tagged in Katie Jarvis