French actress Juliette Binoche has been named President of the Jury for the 2025 edition of the Cannes Film Festival in May.
The honor which was announced on Tuesday morning Paris time will fall exactly 40 years after the Oscar-winning The English Patient star first touched down at the festival with André Téchiné’s Palme d’Or contender Rendez-vous in 1985.
Binoche follows in the footsteps of U.S. director Greta Gerwig whose jury feted Sean Baker’s Anora with the Palme d’Or last year.
“I’m looking forward to sharing these life experiences with the members of the Jury and the public. In 1985, I walked up the steps for the first time with the enthusiasm and uncertainty of a young actress; I never imagined I’d return 40 years later in the honorary role of President of the Jury. I appreciate the privilege, the responsibility and the absolute need for humility,” said Binoche.
The French actress, whose career spans just over 40 years and more than 70 credits, has often said that she “born at Cannes”.
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Binoche starred in Rendez-vous as an eager young actress who flees her provincial home for Paris in search of fame and embarks on a series of turbulent relationships with three men played respectively by Lambert Wilson, Wadeck Stanczak and Jean-Louis Trintignant.
The film won Téchiné best director and launched a 21-year-old Binoche, even if it was her co-star Stanczak who won a Newcomer César the following year.
Since then, Binoche has appeared in another seven Palme d’Or contenders spanning Micheal Haneke’s Code Unknown (2000) and Hidden (2007); Abbas Kiarostami’s Certified Copy (2010), for which she won Best Actress; David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis (2012); Olivier Assayas’ Sils Maria (2014), Bruno Dumont’s Slack Bay (2016) and Tran Anh Hùng’s The Taste Of Things (2023).
Her filmography also includes works by Cannes regulars Leos Carax, Claire Denis, Amos Gitaï, Naomi Kawase, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Krzysztof Kieślowski, and Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
“Winner of the most prestigious awards, Juliette Binoche does not seek virtuosity, preferring to trust only in emotion and the elusive truth of the moment,” wrote the Cannes Film Festival in its release announcing Binoche’s presidency.
“She is doubtless encouraged, as Louis Malle pointed out after Damage, by ‘her love affair with the camera, and her stupefying presence and intensity’.”
The festival cited her multi-faceted career which has also included series such as The Staircase and The New Look; theater, with the production of Antigone with Ivo van Hove; dance, with the joint work In-i with Akram Khan, musical performances with Alexandre Tharaud and painting.
It also noted how Binoche’s work to raise awareness around issues such as education, displaced people, human rights in Iran and ecology and how she has recently got behind the entire filmmaking community in Europe by taking on the role of President of the European Film Academy.
Previous female presidents of the jury span Olivia de Havilland (1965), Sophia Loren (1966), Michèle Morgan (1971), Ingrid Bergman (1973), Jeanne Moreau (1975), Françoise Sagan (1979), Jeanne Moreau (1995), Isabelle Adjani (1997), Liv Ullmann (2001),Isabelle Huppert (2009) and Jane Campion (2014), Cate Blanchett (2018).
“Her far-reaching commitments are reminiscent of those of Olivia de Havilland, remembered for challenging the omnipotence of American studios. That Hollywood legend was President of the Jury of the Festival de Cannes in 1965, passing the baton for the first time to another woman, also a Cinecittà legend, Sophia Loren, 60 years ago. As in a lengthy, beautiful family line, Juliette Binoche’s presidency at this year’s Festival celebrates and brings together the stars of the past.”
The 78th edition of the Cannes Film Festival runs May 13 to 24 2025.
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