The first project being released by the Woody Allen – Amazon Studios collaboration (also to include mini-series), recently titled Café Society, has been chosen to open this year’s Cannes Film Festival.
This announcement marks a double record for the prestigious festival, as it will be Amazon’s first ever release to open at Cannes and Allen’s third (the most in Cannes history). His previous Cannes openers were Hollywood Ending (2002) and Midnight in Paris (2011). The film will be an Official Selection out of Competition and will open on Wednesday May 11 at the Palais des Festivals’ Grand Théâtre Lumière. George Miller (Mad Max Fury Road) will be presiding over the Competition program, of which the remaining titles will be announced on April 14.
Allen’s 2015 film, Irrational Man, which starred Emma Stone (Birdman) and Joaquin Phoenix (I’m Still Here), also premiered at Cannes to relatively positive reviews, but did not stand to par for awards buzz.
Café Society stars Kristen Stewart (Clouds of Sils Maria), Jesse Eisenberg (To Rome with Love), Steve Carell (Date Night), Blake Lively (The Age of Adaline), Corey Stoll (Ant-Man), and Parker Posey (Irrational Man), among others.
The story follows a young man (Eisenberg) freshly arrived to Hollywood in the 1930s in hopes of joining the film industry. There, he gets swept up in both love and the vibrant “café society” that defined the age.This type of lifestyle came to describe the beautiful and fashionable people (movie stars, athletes, etc.) who publicly populated the night club and restaurant scene during the time after the Great Depression and the rise of photo journalism. Allen’s Midnight in Paris touched on the beginnings of this culture when depicting the 1920s parlor parties of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Cole Porter.
Amazon has not set any further release dates (theater or streaming) for Café Society at this time. We will have more on the film as it approaches release.
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