The official jury gave their first press conference on May 11th. President Emir Kusturica opened by saying for the record that “the nature of cinema does not have a parallel with democracy”, adding that, “this is a fun jury so that the melodrama can be completed”. He assured the press that the jury “won’t make pathetic decisions because there is no democracy inside!”

Festival president Gilles Jacob has already declared prior to this Cannes there will be no declarations like Quentin Tarantino made last year regarding his enthusiam for Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 911 (the first time the official jury explained a decision at a press conference) underscoring a cardinal rule for Cannes - decisions are made on the basic of aethetics, not politics.

Honored to be invited to the jury, Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison, quipped “ I know that my judgement is infallible in spite of the fact that I am not in the industry". She promised to “ bring enthusiasm” to the jury.

Actress Salma Hayak explained that ordinarily her presence at festivals has to do with interviews for her new films, but this time at Cannes “visual stimulation will be pushing yourself to understand the films-- and to see them with a 'virgin eyes'". “I have admired these people a long time”, she said of her fellow and sister jurors.

Veteran French director Agnès Varda admitted that she has been coming to Cannes for a long time and therefore has noted “the size and number of films and screenings and markets- an enormous machine important event". “People come just to see films, and can see four or five a day”.
“We are!” , she added. Varda called Cannes , “a cinema event for cinema lovers”

Most importantly to distinguish the high quality of the Cannes event for cinema lovers, Kusturica added that the jury decisions are inherently infallible, as noted previously by Toni Morrison. “Even with mistakes, it's with a human impact, not a box office decision - 'our' decisions”. The jury president emphasized, “the question is that we are mostly going to concentrate on aesthetic decisions”.

Moira Sullivan