Composed of two women and three men from various backgrounds, the short films and Cinéfondation Jury in the 2019 Cannes Film Festival has been revealed.
Chaired by Claire Denis, the Jury will name the Short Film Palme d’or winner from among the 11 films selected in competition. It will be awarded at the closing ceremony on 25 May in the Grand Theatre Lumière.
The five members of the Jury will also be awarding prizes for three of the 17 student films shown as part of the Cinéfondation selection. The Cinéfondation Prizes will be announced by the Jury on 23 May during an awards ceremony in the Buñuel Theatre, which will be followed by a screening of the winning films.
The first is Stacy Martin. Her first steps as an actress were in Lars von Trier’s 2013 film Nymphomaniac. Her acting career took off after that, and she took on multiple projects. In 2015, she starred in Tale of Tales by Matteo Garrone (competition, Cannes 2015), The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun by Joann Sfar and Taj Mahal by Nicolas Saada. In 2017, she and Louis Garrel starred in Godard Mon Amour by Michel Hazanavicius, in competition at Cannes. That same year, she was a part of All the Money in the World by Ridley Scott. In 2018, she shared the screen with both Tahar Rahim for Treat Me Like Fire by Marie Monge selected at the Directors’ Fortnight, and Vincent Lacoste in Amanda by Mikhaël Hers. This year, she was in Casanova, Last Love by Benoît Jacquot and has been filming in the new Nicole Garcia feature alongside Pierre Niney and Benoît Magimel.
The second is Eran Kolirin who was born in 1973. His feature film debut as a director, The Band’s Visit, won him critical acclaim and over 50 prestigious awards around the globe, among them eight Ophir Awards of the Israeli Film Academy, the Un Certain Regard Jury Coup de Cœur Award in Cannes 2007 and the European Film Discovery Award. His second feature film, The Exchange, was selected for the 68th Venice Competition and received several prizes worldwide, including the FIPRESCI Prize at the San Francisco International Film Festival. His third film, Beyond the Mountains and Hills, premiered at Un Certain Regard section in Cannes 2016 and was released to critical acclaim.
The third jury member is Greek filmmaker Panos H. Koutras who started off directing several short films in Paris and London, which toured the world’s films festivals. In 1995, he founded the 100% Synthetic Films production company in Athens and began writing his first feature film, The Attack of the Giant Moussaka, which went on to achieve cult status. After Real Life and Strella films were presented in Toronto and Berlin respectively, his fourth film, Xenia, was selected for Un Certain Regard in 2014. In 2015, he was an Un Certain Regard Jury member. He is currently preparing his fifth feature film, Dodo.
The fourth member is Cătălin Mitulescu who was born in 1972 in Bucharest, Romania. His school short films Bucharest-Wien 8:15 and 17 Minutes Late were both selected in the Cinéfondation in 2001 and 2002. He won the Short Film Palme d’Or for Traffic in 2004. In 2006, his first feature film, The Way I Spent the End of the World, was selected for Un Certain Regard and received Best Actress Award. Loverboy, his second film, premiered at Un Certain Regard in 2011 and won prizes in Sarajevo and Vilnius FF. By the Rails, his third feature, had its International Premiere at Karlovy Vary IFF in 2016, where it was awarded a Special Mention. He recently completed Heidi, his fourth film, to be released in 2019.
