Cannes Film Festival 2011 poster revealed...

Ever since its creation, the Festival de Cannes has remained faithful to its founding purpose: To draw attention to and raise the profile of films with the aim of contributing towards the development of cinema, boosting the film industry worldwide and celebrating cinema at an international level. And Cannes has been the dream of every filmmaker, whichever part of the world they reside in or in whatever language they make a film. Not only the selection of the films, but every program designed around the festival has its own importance and recognition. Naturally, the poster is supposed to be one of the highlights to such an important festival.

One of the highlights leading up to the Cannes Film Festival is the official poster, and this year’s poster is simply outstanding. The poster of the 64th edition is an elegant black-and-white shot of Faye Dunaway photographed by director Jerry Schatzberg in 1970 for his movie “Puzzle of a Downfall Child”, in which she essayed the central character. The stunning official poster for the 2011 edition of the Cannes Film Festival features Faye Dunaway at her most glamorous, but it also draws attention to a forgotten film and supermodel.

On the official website, Cannes officials describe the image in the poster as a “Model of sophistication and timeless elegance, it is an embodiment of the cinematic dream that the Festival de Cannes seeks to maintain.”

A restored copy of “Puzzle of a Downfall Child” will be screened at the Festival and released in France this fall. Dunaway and Schatzberg will both attend. Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris” will kick off the Cannes Film Festival on May 11, and with Robert De Niro as president of this year’s jury, it should be an interesting fortnight. The list of films in competition will be announced in Paris on April 14.