He might equally feel at home on the Lido, but it is on the Croisette where the Sixth Generation Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke will take a bow. Annually presented on the opening day of Directors’ Fortnight sidebar, the filmmaker behind seminal films Unknown Pleasures (2002), The World (2004), Still Life (2006) and we’ll throw in 2013’s A Touch of Sin for good measure, will be presenting a masterclass for 2000’s the Platform (Thursday May 14th at Théâtre Croisette – JW Marriott). Zhangke is currently in prep mode with Mountains May Depart (#10 on our Most Anticipated list) which is looking less of a 2015/possible Venice title and more like a 2016 release.
The Carrosse d’Or Prize has been awarded since 2002 by the filmmakers of the SRF to honor one of their own during Cannes Film Festival — previous winners include Cannes Film Fest royalty in Jim Jarmusch (2008), Nuri Bilge Ceylan (2012) and last year was awarded to Alain Resnais (2014) who passed away a couple of months before he was supposed to receive the honor.