The stars are out in the South of France for the 65th annual Cannes Film Festival, which kicked off Wednesday. The festival invites only the best, most innovative filmmakers from all over the world, and this year's lineup is one of the most promising in quite some time.
Things kicked off today with the world premiere of Wes Anderson's latest, Moonrise Kingdom. The lucky audience found itself swept up in the throes of young love, as the film's pair of unknown teen stars—Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward—managed to outshine established vets (and Anderson regulars) Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman, as well as Bruce Willis, Frances McDormand, Edward Norton, and Tilda Swinton. 
Gilman and Hayward play two small-town kids who decide they love each other enough to run away together. The rest of the cast plays various townspeople who form the search party. Moonrise Kingdom scored mostly positive reviews after its premiere, and it hits theaters in limited release on May 25.
The rest of the festival, as always blends international art-house cinema with mainstream American fare. There will be plenty of A-listers hitting the scene this year as Brad Pitt, Nicole Kidman, Matthew McConaughey, Zac Efron (OMG!), and Robert Pattinson and Kristin Stewart (double OMG!) all have films premiering there over the next week and a half.
One of the most intriguing titles is David Cronenberg's Cosmopolis, which stars Pattinson as a billionaire playboy who hops in his limo, with the intent of getting a haircut, and ends up involving himself in lots of sex, drugs and murder. As always with Cronenberg, the film looks absolutely bananas, and festival watchers seem especially curious about this one considering the seemingly odd casting choice.
Other hotly anticipated titles include Lawless (#14 on our Summer Movie Preview), Killing Them Softly (starring Pitt and directed by Andrew Dominik of The Assassination of Jesse James fame), Mud (director Jeff Nichols' follow-up to last year's Take Shelter), and On the Road (Walter Salles long-awaited adaptation of the beloved Jack Kerouac novel).
We'll be back over the next week with updates on how these films (and plenty of others) play and what their awards chances are.
