For the second year running, a Mexican film will compete for the Palme d’Or, the major prize of the Cannes Film Festival, which begins on May 15.
The third feature by Amat Escalante, “Heli,” spotlights a small town in the state of Guanajuato, whose residents either work at the local auto assembly plant or for the drug cartels.
The Palme d’Or is presented to the director of the best feature film of the official competition. Among the 18 films selected for the prize are Steven Soderbergh’s “Behind The Candelabra,” Roman Polanski’s “La Vénus À La Fourrure’ and Ethan and Joel Coen’S “Inside Llewyn Davis.”
In 2012, Mexican directed Carlos Reygadas was nominated for “Post Tenebras Lux,” a visual and poetic work that divided critics for its lack of narrative.
Spanish director Diego Quemada Diez will be looking to emulate Michel Franco, who won the “Un Certain Regard” Prize last year with the Mexican produced “Despues de Lucia.” In the competition is Quemada Diez’s debut feature “La jaula de oro,” a story of two teenagers, from Mexico and Guatemala, crossing a cruel country in search of a better life beyond the Mexican border.