Cannes movie explores roots of Sudan bloodshed, making festival history

Benjamin DODMAN

21 May 2023 at 1:08 pm·1-min read

Tunisia’s Kaouther Ben Hania joined early frontrunners for the Palme d’Or in Cannes with her haunting “Four Daughters”, about the decision by a group of teenage girls to join the jihad in Syria. Meanwhile, Africa’s “Cannes moment” continued with the timely screening of Sudanese drama “Goodbye Julia”, whose director spoke to FRANCE 24 about the bittersweet experience of attending the world’s premier film festival while his home country is at war.

The Cannes Film Festival reached a soggy half-way mark on Sunday, with a batch of fine movies mercifully making up for the filthy weather that has thrown a wet blanket over the Riviera’s film shindig.

Martin Scorsese and his fellow travellers Robert De Niro and Leonardo Di Caprio enjoyed a triumphant victory lap at the press conference for “Killers of The Flower Moon”, which garnered rave reviews after its gala premiere last night.

Based on a bestseller about a wave of murders among oil-rich Osage Indians in the 1920s, the movie marked a long-awaited return for Scorsese and De Niro, almost half a century after the feverish premiere of “Taxi Diver” (1976) resulted in boos and walkouts on the Croisette – as well as a Palme d’Or.

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