The Great Gatsby to open Cannes Film Festival in May

Just announced today that The Great Gatsby (in 3D!) film starring Carey Mulligan as Daisy Buchanan with Joel Edgerton, Tobey Maguire, and Leonardo DiCaprio will be opening The 66th Cannes Film Festival in May 15th.

Here's more info. via Cannes' website:

Baz Luhrmann, Leonardo DiCaprio and Scott Fitzgerald to inaugurate the Festival de Cannes

It is on The Great Gatsby by Australian director Baz Luhrmann, that the curtain will rise at the inauguration of the 66^th Festival de Cannes, on Wednesday 15^th May, in the Grand Théâtre Lumière of the Palais des Festivals, out of Competition in the Official Selection.

Adapted from the famous novel by American author Francis Scott Fitzgerald and set against the roaring twenties on the East Coast of the United States, the film depicts the romantic and tragic figure of Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio), as narrated by his friend Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire). Carey Mulligan is Daisy Buchanan, whose husband is played by Joel Edgerton. This prestigious occasion will also be graced with the presence of Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan, as well as the American pop star, rapper Jay-Z.

"It is a great honor for all those who have worked on The Great Gatsby to open the Cannes Film Festival. We are thrilled to return to a country, place and festival that has always been so close to our hearts, not only because my first film Strictly Ballroom was screened there 21 years ago, but also because F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote some of the most poignant and beautiful passages of his extraordinary novel just a short distance away at a villa outside Saint-Raphaël."

Produced by Warner Bros. Pictures and Village Roadshow Pictures, the film was scripted by Baz Luhrmann and his faithful co-screenwriter Craig Pearce, based on Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel. Read full article.

The Great Gatsby opens in U.S. and Canada theaters on May 10th, 2013 and will be release internationally the following week!

Here’s the official synopsis for The Great Gatsby:

The Great Gatsby follows Fitzgerald-like, would-be writer Nick Carraway as he leaves the Midwest and comes to New York City in the spring of 1922, an era of loosening morals, glittering jazz and bootleg kings. Chasing his own American Dream, Nick lands next door to a mysterious, party-giving millionaire, Jay Gatsby, and across the bay from his cousin, Daisy, and her philandering, blue-blooded husband, Tom Buchanan. It is thus that Nick is drawn into the captivating world of the super rich, their illusions, loves and deceits. As Nick bears witness, within and without the world he inhabits, he pens a tale of impossible love, incorruptible dreams and high-octane tragedy, and holds a mirror to our own modern times and struggles.