Nicole Kidman is the undisputed queen of the Cannes film festival, which opens Wednesday in the French Riviera resort, starring in three of its most eagerly awaited films.
The Australian actress is in two in the running for its top prize, the Palme d’Or, and plays a fashion and music maven in “How to Talk to Girls at Parties” in the official selection.
The film, adapted from a Neil Gaiman short story, has Kidman adopting Elle Fanning’s alien as her protege.
Kidman also shows her trademark mix of hauteur and vulnerability as a pent-up governess of a Mississippi girls school in Sofia Coppola’s highly touted remake of “The Beguiled.”
The film, set against the backdrop of the American Civil War, has Colin Farrell as an injured Union soldier who seduces Kidman’s charges and drives her wild with desire.
She teams up with the Irish actor again in Greek maestro Yorgos Lanthimos’s “The Killing of a Sacred Deer,” this time as his wife in the story of a surgeon who gets disastrously drawn into the life of a dysfunctional family.
While the 49-year-old has never won a prize at Cannes, she has long been a festival favorite, taking a string of arthouse roles even after becoming one of Hollywood’s most bankable stars after her split from her first husband Tom Cruise.
It was one of many reinventions that have taken the high-school dropout from Australian teen movies like “BMX Bandits” to the top of her profession.
Kidman has never lacked daring, risking working with the notorious Danish auteur Lars Von Trier, who was later banned from Cannes after saying he was a Nazi.

Source: Arab News