Cannes Film Festival 2015: 8 Movies We Can't Wait to See

The Cannes Film Festival — one of the world’s oldest, most glamorous, most sun-dappled cinematic celebrations — kicks off its 68th year this week, with opening-night festivities planned for May 13. Between the 19 films in competition, and the numerous sidebar premieres (including Hollywood ringers like Mad Max: Fury Road and Pixar’s Inside Out), there’s an almost overwhelming number of titles to take in during the festival’s 11-day duration. But who’s going to complain about watching movies on the French Riviera? This year’s prestigious competition jury is headed by Joel and Ethan Coen (whose 1991 movie Barton Fink won the Palme d’Or, the festival’s top prize) and includes such luminaries as Jake Gyllenhaal, Guillermo del Toro, and Sienna Miller. Yahoo Movies will be on the ground in Cannes this week to get an early look at some of the exciting projects coming to theaters soon. Check back here for more from the festival, but in the meantime, here’s a selection of the ones we’re watching out for:

‘The Sea of Trees’ (Cannes 2015)

The Sea of Trees
Directed by: Gus Van Sant
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Ken Watanabe, Naomi Watts
The latest swerve in the McConaissance journey finds the actor playing Arthur, a wayward American who travels to the dense forest near Japan’s Mt. Fuji to contemplate his existence — and presumably commit suicide, one of the more frequent activities in this particular neck of the woods. Along the way, he meets a fellow death-haunted traveler (Watanabe) and the two stick close for their walk into the wild.

‘Sicario’ (Lionsgate)

Sicario
Directed by: Denis Villeneuve
Starring: Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin, Benecio Del Toro
Villeneuve made a striking impression in 2013 with his tense kidnapping drama Prisoners and the psychological twin thriller Enemy. He may have a Blade Runner sequel in his future, but we’re excited to see his new Cannes premiere: A crime drama about an FBI agent (Blunt) enlisted to infiltrate a Mexican drug cartel.

‘Macbeth’ (The Weinstein Company)

Macbeth
Directed by: Justin Kurzel
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Marion Cotillard
The latest screen iteration of Shakespeare’s cursed Scottish Play stars Fassbender as the tragically ambitious nobleman and Cotillard as his scheming Lady. The two will reunite with Kurzel for his next project, an entirely different kind of adaptation: the movie version of the video game Assassin’s Creed.

‘Carol’ (The Weinstein Company)

Carol
Directed by: Todd Haynes
Starring: Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson
Haynes hasn’t been in Cannes competition since 1998’s Velvet Goldmine, and his return promises to be a an attention-getter at the very least. An adaptation of novelist Patricia Highsmith’s lesbian potboiler The Price of Salt, Carol follows a department store clerk (Mara) in 1950s New York who falls for an alluring older woman (Blanchett).

‘The Lobster’ (Cannes 2015)

The Lobster
Directed by: Yorgos Lanthimos
Starring: Colin Farrell, Rachel Weisz, Lea Seydoux, John C. Reilly
The first English-language movie from the director of 2009’s Dogtooth, The Lobster is surreal love story of sorts about a dystopian near-future in which singletons have 45 days to find a suitable mate or they’re turned into an animal and set loose in the wild.

‘A Tale of Love and Darkness’ (Cannes 2015)

A Tale of Love and Darkness
Directed by: Natalie Portman
Starring: Natalie Portman, Gilad Kahana, Amir Tessler
This isn’t Portman’s first time behind the camera: She’s helmed two shorts before, including part of 2008’s anthology movie New York, I Love You. But her feature-length directorial debut (presented at Cannes in the special screening section) is certainly ambitious. It’s a period drama about the early days of the state of Israel based on the memoir by journalist Amos Oz.

The Assassin (Well Go USA)

The Assassin
Directed by: Hou Hsiao-Hsien
Starring: Shu Qi, Chang Chen, Zhou Yun
This new martial arts epic is from the legendary Taiwanese director who won a Jury Prize at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival for The Puppetmaster. The title assassin is a young woman (Shu Qi) who was kidnapped as a child in 9th century China and trained as a righteous killer. Her latest target: The man she’s intended to marry.

Amy (A24)

Amy
Directed by: Asif Kapadia
Kapadia, the director behind the car-racing documentary Senna, tackles another gone-too-soon supernova: the late pop star Amy Winehouse, who died in 2011 at the age of 27. The doc comes to Cannes surrounded by some controversy after Winehouse’s family publicly condemned the film in April. It’s screening as part of the out-of-competition midnight series.