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The opening of The Rider - winner, with A Ciambra, of the Directors Fortnight-  focuses on a horse’s mane, spreading and floating in slow motion as the animal bucks and whinnies. It’s an indication that this cowboy story is going to be told differently and hints at the visuals to come that capture the vast open spaces and rugged isolation of South Dakota.

As Cannes passed its midpoint, one name seemed to be on everybody's lips: Nicole Kidman. The first of three films with Nicole leading the cast, Yorgos Lanthimos' The Killing of a Sacred Deer, shook the Palais with riotous applause, four minutes of which were dedicated to Nicole, who plays the wife of Colin Farrell's brilliant neurosurgeon, the pivot of a complicated family drama.

“The P in HFPA stands for press, but it could also stand for philanthropy”, said HFPA president Lorenzo Soria in his opening remarks on Sunday, May 21, at the Association’s annual Cannes party. This year the event served as a benefit for the International Rescue Committee (IRC), a nonprofit organization that responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people who have been devastated by conflict and disaster, to which the HFPA donated $500,000.

The nerves of the first days of Cannes are wearing off. People are having fun.

In its US landing Ridley Scott’s Alien: Covenant had the honor of a $36. 5 million first place debut.

The first weekend of Cannes is party time par excellence - and the HFPA, which already throws the Party of the Year (a little thing called the Golden Globes.

Kristen Stewart is in Cannes making her directorial debut with her short film Come Swim. Stewart, 27, is not new to Cannes - she was here as an actress with Twilight and Café Society and again last year in Personal Shopper -  but this is the first time she's here as a director and screenwriter.

Day four of the festival was dominated, at least briefly, by the “security scare” at the Palais des Festivals. As if journalists were not frayed enough by the interminable lines for screenings and the extra security, the several hundred who had lined up for over an hour to see Michel Hazanavicius’ Le Redoutable were suddenly ordered to move back by surging security officers.

The familiar with a twist. Ladies are foregoing petticoats, women are baring more, and peach appeared in shoes and clothes.

Boldly original, Okja, the new film from the talented South Korean writer-director Bong Joon Ho, is not just an ambitious film with a social message, but a charming fable about the incomparable love of a young girl for her special “Super Pig,” whose name provides the film’s title. Working with a larger budget than the usual, and defined by some dazzling state of the art special effects, Okja is the most eccentric film to date in competition at the 2017 Cannes Film Fest.