Legendary French actress Catherine Deneuve, best known for her roles in films like Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Roman Polanski’s Repulsion, Luis Buñuel’s Belle du Jour (pictured above), and Francois Truffout’s The Last Metro, will be among the honored guests attending this year’s Febiofest in Prague next week, festival organizers announced yesterday.
Deneuve will attend the opening ceremony of this year’s Febiofest on March 15, where she will receive the festival’s highest honor, a Kristián award for contribution to world cinema.
The 74-year-old Deneuve’s career spans six decades, and includes recent features like the 2008 holiday favorite A Christmas Tale and the 2004 comedy-drama Kings and Queen, both of which will be screened during the festival.
Deneuve has been nominated for 14 César Awards, the French equivalent of the Oscar, winning twice for The Last Metro and Indochine, for which she also received her only Academy Award nomination.
Most recently, Deneuve has sparked some mild controversy for her comments on the “puritanical wave” of the French version of the recent #MeToo movement.
Arnaud Desplechin, director of Kings and Queen and A Christmas Tale, will also be among the featured guests at this year’s Febiofest in Prague. A special profile dedicated to his work will also screen the films The Life of the Dead, The Sentinel, The Beloved, The Forest, and his most recent, Ismael’s Ghosts.
Deneuve and Desplechin join an impressive lineup of special guests at this year’s Febiofest that also includes French director Leos Carax (Holy Motors, Mauvais Sang, The Lovers on the Bridge), Hungarian director Kornél Mundruczó (White God, Jupiter’s Moon), and Czech actress Daniela Kolářová (The Elementary School), all of whom will be profiled in special festival sections.
Serbian director Goran Paskaljević, French actors Hippolyte Girardot and Thierry de Peretti, English actor Mark Gatiss, and numerous other filmmakers will also be on hand at this year’s Febiofest to present their work.
Febiofest, one of the largest film festivals in Prague and the Czech Republic, will take place from March 15-23 at CineStar Anděl in Prague 5.
Tickets (99 CZK per film) will go on sale tomorrow morning at the CineStar Anděl box office and from March 9 online.
