Festival de Cannes

Now regarded as the crème de la crème event for international film premieres, the Festival de Cannes first opened on this day in 1946. Although the festival was meant to launch September 1^st, 1939, it was shut down after one screening (William Dieterle’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame), when Germany invaded Poland and France declared war. The festival was again shut down due to political turmoil in May 1968 when the student revolution led to a national strike. Auteurs Francois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard clung to the curtain across the stage of Palais de Festivals to prevent films from being screened and show support for the protestors.