While the official selection of the 60th Cannes Film Festival (May 16-27, 2007) will be revealed on April 19 and French director Pascale Ferran has been named president of the Un Certain Regard jury, rumours have been intensifying about the festival competition line-up.

According to different sources, the event will open with Wong Kar Wai’s My Blueberry Nights and close with Zodiac by US director David Fincher. Out of competition titles said to feature include Francis Ford Coppola’s Youth Without Youth and Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean's Thirteen.
Potential Golden Palm contenders include Denys Arcand’s Age of Innocence, Todd Haynes’ I'm Not There, The Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men, French productions Ballon rouge [trailer] by Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao Hsien (see article), Paranoid Park [trailer] by US helmer Gus Van Sant (see article) and Promise Me This [trailer] by Bosnian filmmaker Emir Kusturica.

Completing the selection are Kantoku Banzai by Japan’s Takeshi Kitano, Beyond The Years by Korea’s Im Kwon-taek and Silent Lightby Mexico’s Carlos Reygadas, who is currently fine-tuning the mixing of his film in Madrid.

Other films rumoured to take part include You, the Living [trailer, film focus] by Sweden’s Roy Andersson (see news), Auf der anderen Seite des Lebens by Turkish-German director Fatih Akin, Alexandra by Russia’s Alexandre Sokourov and The Man From London [trailer] by Hungary’s Bela Tarr (see article).

Meanwhile, an air of uncertainty hangs over Woody Allen’s Cassandra's Dreams [trailer], Sean Penn’s Into the Wild, David Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises, Michael Moore’s Sicko and A Mighty Heart by UK director Michael Winterbottom, as well as new films by Asian directors Lee Chang-dong, Wang Xiaoshuai and Naomi Kawase.

Among the French films expected to feature are Claude Miller’s Un secret [trailer] (see news) and Gaël Morel’s Après Lui [trailer] (see news). A grand outsider, Paris [trailer] by Cédric Klapisch (see article) could also join the line-up if it is finished in time.

Marjane Satrapi’s animated film Persepolis (see article), Marc Caro’s Dante 01 [trailer] (see news), Catherine Breillat’s Une vieille maîtresse [trailer] and Raphael Nadjari’s Tehilim are also expected to compete.

Documentaries rumoured to be selected include Nicolas Philibert’s Return to Normandie and Michelange Quay’s Eat, For This is My Body.

Trivial by first-time director Sophie Marceau (see article) could prove the dark horse of the event.

Meanwhile, the jury of the Directors’ Fortnight will be spoiled for choice with La question humaine [trailer] by Nicolas Klotz (see article), Damien Odoul’s L'Histoire de Richard O. [trailer] by (see news), Serge Bozon’s La France [trailer] (see news) and Swedish co-production Capitaine Achab by Philippe Ramos (see article).

It has been confirmed that Romania will have one film at Cannes (Scene of a crime by Cristi Puiu?), as will Ireland and Spain (Jaime Rosales’s La soledad), while Amos Gitaï will race against the clock to finish his French/Italian/Israeli co-production Disengagement in order to participate at what is expected to be an exceptional festival.