Cannes, the global Colosseum of film, readies for 78th edition with new challenges on horizon

That’s not just because of the long list of anticipated films set to premiere at the Cote d’Azur festival (including films from Spike Lee, Wes Anderson, Lynne Ramsay, Richard Linklater and Ari Aster) and the extensive coterie of stars set to walk the fabled red carpet (Jennifer Lawrence, Denzel Washington, Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart among them). As the movies, and the Oscar race, have grown more international, the global launchpad of Cannes has become only more central to the larger film ecosystem — even with the ongoing absence of Netflix. The Cannes Film Festival originally emerged in the World War II years, when the rise of fascism in Italy led to the founding of an alternative to the then-government controlled Venice Film Festival.