The poster for the 64th Festival de Cannes celebrates Faye Dunaway. The shot was taken by film-maker Jerry Schatzberg in 1970.
I’ve often wondered why a festival so dedicated to the future of cinema so frequently chooses such retro images. One reason – though perhaps not the best – is that it is impossible to choose a key image when the films are still being chosen.
Festivals often use the strongest image from their strongest film as a poster. This is totally impossible in the case of Cannes. The very disparate style of films shown is another reason why it is difficult to take a thematic approach.
But one would think that with the graphic talent available in France, a more ambitious graphic policy could be applied.
So what we get is another slick shot of a movie diva. The irony is that the prizes and media attention often go to dark and alt films such as “Antichrist”. Go figure.
Why Dunaway for the 2011 poster?
The actual reason Dunaway was chosen this year is that a restored copy of “Puzzle of a Downfall Child” will be shown at Cannes in the presence of the director and Dunaway before being released in France next autumn. The poster was designed by the H5 agency in Paris.
Faye Dunaway is a respected American actress that occupies a singular place in movie history. She has been active in the entertainment industry since the early 1960s. Over the years, she has received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and a BAFTA Award.
Dunaway’s most notable films include The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), the drama The Arrangement (1969), the revisionist western Little Big Man (1970), the neo-noir mystery Chinatown (1974), the action-drama disaster The Towering Inferno (1974), the political thriller Three Days of the Condor (1975), and the satire Network (1976), for which she won an Academy Award for Best Actress.
Her career evolved to more mature character roles in subsequent years, often in independent films, beginning with her controversial portrayal of Joan Crawford in the 1981 film Mommie Dearest1. Dunaway has also performed on stage in several plays, including A Man for All Seasons (1961–63), After the Fall (1964), Hogan’s Goat (1965–67), and A Streetcar Named Desire (1973).
It could also be, of course, that the designers fell in love with the photo – that happens!