64th annual Festival de Cannes jurors announced [UPDATE]

Robert De Niro had been announced some time ago as the President of the Feature Films Jury for the 64th Festival de Cannes. Today, they announced the remaning jurors. The complete Feature Films Jury is listed below.

The remaining juries have yet to be announced. However, all of the jury presidents have been named. The President of the Camera d’Or Jury will be South Korean director Bong Joon-ho who previously attended Cannes with his films The Host, Mother and the anthology film Tokyo!. Two-time Palme d'Or winner Emir Kusturica (for When Father Was Away on Business and Underground) will head the Un Certain Regard section. French director Michel Gondry will preside over the short film and Cinéfondation jury.

The 64th annual Festival de Cannes takes place on May 11-22 in Cannes France.

[UPDATE, April 20] The Short Film and Cinéfondation jurors serving with President Michel Gondry have been announced. They are Julie Gayet, Jessica Hausner, Corneliu Porumboiu and Joao Pedro Rodrigues. Their biographical information is below.

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JURY OF THE 64TH FESTIVAL DE CANNES

The Feature Films Jury, presided by Robert De Niro (actor, director, producer), is composed by:

Martina Gusman (actress and producer, Argentina)
Nansun Shi (producer, China)
Uma Thurman (actress, script writer, producer, USA)
Linn Ullmann (critic and writer, Norway)
Olivier Assayas (director, France)
Jude Law (actor, UK)
Mahamat Saleh Haround (director, Chad)
Johnnie To (director, producer, China/Hong-Kong)

Martina Gusman studied Applied Arts at the University of Buenos Aires and took acting courses with Carlos Gandolfo.
In 2002, with Pablo Trapero, she created Matanza Cine, a production company where she has been the executive producer for some twelve films.
Martina Gusman acted in three films by Pablo Trapero: Born and Bred (Nacido y Criado), in 2006, Lion's Den (Leonera), in Competition at the Festival de Cannes in 2008, and Carancho, presented at Certain Regard in 2010.

Nansun Shi was born in Hong Kong and studied in Great Britain before going to work for the legendary studio Cinema City. In 1984, she and her husband Tsui Hark founded their own production company, Film Workshop Co. Ltd., which produced many successful films. Notably, she was the producer of Infernal Affairs for which Martin Scorsese shot a remake, The Departed.

Uma Thurman grew up in the United States. Noticed by two New York impresarios, she studied acting at the Professional Children's School. After her debut role in 1988 in Johnny, be Good, she made her name with two international successes the same year: Terry Gilliam’s The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, and Stephen Frears’ Dangerous Liaisons.
Since then, she has worked with Philip Kaufman, Phil Joanou, Gus Van Sant, John Boorman, Andrew Nichol, and Woody Allen.
In Mad Dog and Glory, presented in Cannes in 1993, she played opposite Robert De Niro.
It was with director Quentin Tarantino that she took on her most famous roles, in Pulp Fiction, which won the Palme d’Or in 1994, and then, ten years later, as the heroine in Kill Bill 1 & 2.

Linn Ullmann is a writer. After her studies in literature in the United States, she became a literary critic for a major Norwegian daily newspaper. She has won numerous literary prizes for her books: her first, Before You Sleep came out in 1999, followed in 2001 by Stella Descending and then by Grace in 2002. Her latest novel, A Blessed Child (2005) has met with unprecedented critical acclaim.

Linn Ullmann is the daughter of Liv Ullmann and Ingmar Bergman. She came to the Festival de Cannes in 1997 to receive the “Palme des Palmes” on behalf of her father, Ingmar Bergman, at the du 50th Anniversary Ceremony.

Olivier Assayas studied at the ENSBA school of fine arts in Paris, pursuing his passion for literature, painting and film. During the 1980s, he wrote for the Cahiers du Cinéma and co-authored scripts with André Téchiné for Scene of the Crime (Le lieu du crime) and Rendez-vous before making his first film in 1986, Disorder (Désordre).
Since then, he has made more than fifteen films, including Cold Water (L’eau froide), Irma Vep, Sentimental Destinies (Les destinées sentimentales), Demonlover, Clean and Boarding Gate, which were presented at the Festival de Cannes. In 2010, he presented Carlos Out of Competition in Cannes.

Mahamat Saleh Haroun was born in Abéché in Chad. In 1980, the war forced him to flee to France as a refugee, where he studied film and worked as a journalist. In 1994, he made his first film and went on to receive a prize at the Venice festival for Bye Bye Africa, his second feature film. His reputation as an auteur was sealed with Daratt, which won a jury prize in Venice. In competition at the Festival de Cannes in 2010, he received the Jury Prize for A Screaming Man.

Jude Law started his career in theatre before turning to film. He was noticed in Gattaca in 1997, and a series of hits ensued, in which he demonstrated his elegant acting in every film genre. He has worked with the great names in film: Steven Spielberg, David Cronenberg, Clint Eastwood, Sam Mendes, Wong Kar Wai and three times with Anthony Minghella, for whom he played The Talented Mr. Ripley.

In 2009, he returned to the stage in London to play Hamlet.

Johnnie To was born in Hong Kong. He began working in television, before shooting his first feature film, The Enigmatic Case. He continued with martial arts films, comedies, and historical films. It was Breaking News, selected at the Festival de Cannes in 2004, that made his name with international audiences. He returned to the Croisette with Election and Election 2 (2005-2006), followed by Triangle (2007) and Vengeance (2009).


The jury of the Festival de Cannes will adjudicate between the 19 films in competition before naming the winners of the seven awards, to be presented during the Closing Ceremony, and which will culminate in the announcement of the Palme d’Or.

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The Cinéfondation and Short Films Jury presided by Michel GONDRY will welcome:

Julie GAYET, Jessica HAUSNER, Corneliu PORUMBOIU and João Pedro RODRIGUES.

They will have to choose First, Second and Third prize winners from the sixteen final-year films featuring in the 2011 Cinéfondation Selection. These three films will walk away with prize money of 15,000€, 11,250€ and 7,500€ respectively.
The prizes will be awarded by the Jury on Friday 20th May during a ceremony in the Salle Buñuel which will be followed by a screening of the winning films.

This same Jury will also select the winner of the Short Film Palme d’or to be awarded during the Closing Ceremony on Sunday 22nd May.


Julie GAYET, Actress and Producer, France

Julie Gayet began her acting career in A la belle étoile, three years before winning the Romy Schneider Prize in 1996. Since then she has starred in films directed by Michel Deville, Agnès Varda, Merzak Allouache, Emmanuel Mouret and Patrice Leconte, to name but a few. In 2007, she founded her own production company, Rouge International, which would go on to carry out ambitious projects such as Fix me and Huit fois debout.

Jessica HAUSNER, Director and Producer, Austria

Having studied at the Filmakademie de Vienne, Jessica’s first short film, Flora (1996), was awarded a Léopard d’or in Locarno while her final-year film received special praise from the Cinéfondation Jury at Cannes. Her first two feature films, Lovely Rita (2001) and Hotel (2004), were selected for the Un Certain Regard section. Her subsequent film, Lourdes, was invited to compete in Venice in 2009 where it won the FIPRESCI Prize.

Corneliu PORUMBOIU, Director, Romania

His first short film, Calatorie la oras (A Trip to the City) was awarded second prize by the Cinéfondation in 2004.
His first feature film, 12:08 East of Bucharest won the Caméra d’or at Cannes in 2006. Corneliu returned to Un Certain Regard in 2009 with Police, Adjective (FIPRESCI Prize).

João Pedro RODRIGUES, Director, Portugal

João Pedro RODRIGUES started out as an Assistant Director and Editor. In 1997, his short film, Parabéns! (Happy Birthday) won an award at the Venice Mostra. He would appear there again in 2000 with O Fantasma (Phantom), his first feature film. In 2005, the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs screened Odete (Two Drifters), and then in 2009, Morrer Como Um Homem (To Die Like a Man) was selected for Un Certain Regard.