The news of our Quebec wunderkind Xavier Dolan in the 2014 Cannes film festival official competition was confirmed this morning.
Xavier Dolan joins his Canadian brethren David Cronenberg and Atom Egoyan on the Croisette and the country by country breakdown places Canada on par with France, the home of the festival. 3 Canadian films on a total of 18 is unprecedented and this places Canada ahead of the U.S. and the U.K. with 2 each, Turkey, Belgium, Switzerland, Japan, Argentina, Italy and Mauritania only have one each.
Ryan Gosling adds another Canadian presence with his first directorial project Lost River selected in the Un Certain Regard section.
With such a strong presence, representative of the best of Canadian cinema which regularly punctuates major festivals, Canada can claim the cultural gold medal. Our film industry can be proud of this presence, which increases Canada's soft power through the power of culture. Téléfilm Canada and its sisters OMDC (Ontario) and SODEC (Québec) deserve to be applauded for their stalwart financial support which allows our Canadian cinema to aim high. Denis Villeneuve and Kim Nguyen, who went to the Oscars in recent years, are rooted in this industry supported by Téléfilm Canada.
As Canadians are filing their taxes, let us be proud that our public money allows Canada to shine around the world and let's hope that Cannes 2014 will serve as a counterweight to the tar sands that are damaging Canada's brand.
Cannes 2014 by nationality:
Winter Sleep, Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey)
Clouds Of Sils Maria, Olivier Assayas (France)
Saint Laurent, Bertrand Bonello (France)
Maps To The Stars, David Cronenberg (Canada)
Two Days, One Night, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (Belgium)
Mommy, Xavier Dolan (Canada)
The Captive, Atom Egoyan (Canada)
Goodbye To Language, Jean-Luc Godard (Switzerland)
The Search, Michel Hazanavicius (France)
Jimmy's Hall, Ken Loach (UK)
The Homesman, Tommy Lee Jones (US)
Futatsume No Mado, Naomi Kawase (Japan)
Mr Turner, Mike Leigh (UK)
Foxcatcher, Bennett Miller (US)
Leviafan, Andrey Zvyaginstev (Russia)
Wild Tales, Damian Szifron (Argentina)
Le Meraviglie, Alice Rohrwacher (Italy)
The Pain Of Birds, Abderrahmane Sissako (Mauritania)