Cannes Festival announces 2017 selection of competing films

The official selection of the 70th Cannes Film Festival was unveiled Thursday with 18 films competing for the Palme d'Or, organizers said.

In the 2017 edition, the official selection includes 49 features out of 1,930 films.

Four French directors appeared among the list of this year's official selection. They are Francois Ozon with "L'Amant double," Michel Hazanavicius with "La Redoutable," Robin Campillo with "120 Battement par Minute" and Jacques Doillon with "Rodin."

Several U.S. filmmakers will also compete for the festival prizes with Sofia Coppola's "The Beguiled", Todd Haynes's "Wonderstruck", "Good Time" by Benny and Josh Safdie, and "The Meyerowitz Stories" by Noah Baumbach.

Asian cinema will be represented by South Korean films "Okja" by director Bong Joon-Ho and "Geu-Hu" by Hong Sang-soo and Japanese's director Naomi Kawase's "Hikari."

The list of official selection includes also "Aus dem Nichts" by German director Fatih Akin, "Happy End" by Austrian director Michael Haneke, "The Killing of a Sacred Deer" Yorgos Lanthimos, "A Gentle Creature" by Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa, "Jupiter's Moon" by Hungarian director Kornel Mundruczo, "You Were Never Really Here" by Briton Lynne Ramsay and "Nelyubov" by Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev.

The 70th Cannes Film Festival will screen out-of-competition French film "Les fantomes d'Ismael" by Arnaud Desplechin.

Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar will preside over the jury of the 2017 edition. He received the Cannes Filmmaking Award for "Tout sur ma mere" in 1999 and the Screenwriting Award for "Volver" in 2006.

The 70th Cannes Film Festival will run from May 17 to 28. Endit