of competition May 15.
The Great Gatsby will open the 66th Festival de Cannes, organizers said early The movie will screen May 15 at the Grand Theatre Lumiere of the Palais des Festivals, out of competition as part of the Official Selection.
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Leonardo DiCaprio stars in the Baz Luhrmann-directed film, adapted from the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The movie, set on the East Coast during the Roaring Twenties, depicts the romantic and tragic figure of Jay Gatsby (DiCaprio) as narrated by his friend Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire). Carey Mulligan is Daisy Buchanan, whose husband is played by Joel Edgerton. The book was adapted by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce, based on Fitzgerald's 1925 novel.
Rapper Jay-Z, who scored the movie, and Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan also will attend the premiere, organizers said.
"It is a great honor for all those who have worked on The Great Gatsby to open the Cannes Film Festival," Luhrmann said in a statement. "We are thrilled to return to a country, place and festival that has always been so close to our hearts, not only because my first film, Strictly Ballroom, was screened there 21 years ago, but also because F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote some of the most poignant and beautiful passages of his extraordinary novel just a short distance away at a villa outside St. Raphael."
This will mark the second time in festival history that the opening film will be screened in 3D, following Up in 2009.
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Gatsby opens domestically May 10 and in France on the same day it screens at the festival. The film will be distributed in 2D and 3D by Warner Bros. Pictures and in certain regions by Village Roadshow Pictures.
Luhrmann has twice been honored by the Festival de Cannes, for Strictly Ballroom (Un Certain Regard in 1992) and for Moulin Rouge! at the opening of the festival in 2001.
DiCaprio returns to the Croisette for the first time since the 2007 presentation of The 11th Hour, an ecological documentary he produced.Tuesday local time.
