Film industry professionals, cinema stars, journalists, and cinephiles from all over the world flocked on May 11 to the French Riviera to attend the 64th Cannes International Film Festival.

"The Tree of Life" by American director Terrence Malick has won the 2011 Golden Palm (Palme d'Or), the most prestigious award of the Cannes Film Festival.

Europe's biggest film gathering which runs from May 11 to 22 is expected to register more than 10,000 participants from 101 countries with 4,240 films, up by 5 percent from 2010 edition, according to organizers.

American star Robert De Niro, the jury president and eight jurors including actress Uma Thurman, the French director Olivier Assayas, British actor Jude Law and Norwegian author Linn Ullmann opened the mythical festival's red carpet.

2011 session of Cannes festival will raise its curtains with the screening of U.S. director Woody Allen's out-of competition premiere " Midnight in Paris," a romantic comedy which treats the original themes of artistic inspiration and nostalgia through the story of a family traveling to the French capital for business" forced to confront the illusion that a life different from their own is better".

Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci, whose classics include " Last Tango in Paris" and "The Last Emperor," received an honorary Palme d'Or, a prize created to award "an important filmmaker who never got a Palme d'Or". Twenty films are competing for 2011 Cannes festival top prize.

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Gallery

About the Festival

? History of the Cannes International Film Festival
? Juries of Cannes Film Festival 2011
? Official selection of Cannes Film Festival 2011
? Chinese films?displayed and promoted in?Cannes