The who-is-who of Indian filmdom is at the ongoing Cannes Film Festival in France. Regarded as the most prestigious film festival in the world, Cannes is held annually in the month of May. And while the glitter and glamour on the red carpet gets eyeballs, the festival is primarily for screening and rewarding the best of cinema from around the world. And for that, every year, a jury is formed. This year, the jury has an Indian face in film curator and critic Meenakshi Shedde.
What is the Cannes Film Festival jury?
Since there are a number of competitions and divisions at Cannes, there are multiple juries. The most prominent is the main competition jury, which this year is headed by Swedish director Ruben Östlund and includes actors Brie Larson and Paul Dano among others. Other juries include Un Certain Regard (for films with unusual styles), Camera d’Or (for new and debutant filmmakers), and Cinéfondation (for short films).
In addition, there are three prominent independent juries,the biggest of which is the International Critics Week. It was founded in 1962 and is the oldest parallel section of Cannes and is focussed on discovering new talents. The jury comprises of critics and film experts from around the world. It is here that Meenakshi Shedde is one of the five jury members.
Who is Meenakshi Shedde?
Meenakshi Shedde is a Mumbai-based former journalist, film critic, and curator who has worked in the field of etertainment for close to four decades. She has worked as a jury member for over 25 international film festivals, including Cannes, Berlin, Venice,etc. Meenakshi has also worked as a consultant and curator to many international film festivals, most notably the Bernilale, where she has been the south Asia delegate and festival programmer for 25 years now. Meenakshi has also been a voter at the prestigious Golden Globe Awards in the US.
She is also a film journalist with a 39-year experience having worked with some of the biggest publications in India and abroad and currently freelances for internatioal publications. Meenaksh is also a filmmaker having written, directed, or produced 15 films.
Indians who have served on the Cannes jury earlier
Meenakshi isn’t the first Indian to be a jury member at Cannes. Filmmaker Mrinal Sen served on the jury at the prestigious festival in 1982. Sen was followed by Mira Nair (1990), Arundhati Roy (2000), Aishwary Rai (2003), Nandita Das (2005), Sharmila Tagore (2009), Shekhar Kapur (2010), Vidya Balan (2013), and Deepika Padukone (2022).
