Charlize Theron to captivate Cannes all over again

Hollywood star Charlize Theron will return to the Cannes Film Festival’s 69th edition next week with her Palm d’Or contender, The Last Face, directed by Sean Penn.

Last May, Theron proved to be a darling of the Cannes crowds and one of the lovelies for lensmen as she walked the raging Red Carpet in her dazzling evening gown to attend her, Mad Max: Fury Road, a movie that got a rousing reception. Yes, indeed in a festival that some disdainfully call high brow art and a platform for a kind of cinema that cares two hoots for the lowest common denominator!

Watch Mad Max: Fury Road trailer here:

The Last Face is very, very different from Mad Max, and obviously so, for it comes from a heavyweight like Sean Penn -- who is not just an intensely brilliant actor, but also an auteur par excellence. Celebrated for films like The Thin Red Line, Mystic River, Dead Man Walking, The Pledge, 21 Grams and Into the Wild, Penn’s latest drama, The Last Face is set in a war-torn country and was shot extensively in some of the most splendid spots in South Africa.

Read: Cannes 2016 | No Indian film makes it to the film festival

Read: If these rumours are true, the 2016 Cannes Film Festival could be great

Read: Asghar Farhadi’s The Salesman added to Cannes Competition

Read: Oscar Pistorius film to be introduced to distributors at Cannes

The plot follows the director of an international aid agency (Theron) as she embarks on a conflicting-controversial love affair with a relief-aid doctor, essayed by Javier Bardem (Seen in movies like No Country for Old Men, Vicky Christina Barcelona, Biutiful and in Skyfall -- as the villain, and what a magnificent performance that was!).

Theron has been talked about for her varied roles in Prometheus, Snow White and the Huntsman, The Astronaut’s Wife, Sleepwalking and so on. And as the festival begins its roll on May 11, Theron will once again get the Cannes crowds into a state of adulatory frenzy -- and provide all the seduction for shutterbugs.

(Gautaman Bhaskaran will cover the Cannes Film Festival from May 11 to 22.)