‘Jeanne du Barry,’ Johnny Depp’s latest release, to open Haifa Film Festival

To many, Johnny Depp is the king of cool and no amount of legal trouble can change that, so it’s fitting that he plays King Louis XV in the new film, Jeanne du Barry, which the 39th Haifa International Film Festival announced on Monday will be its opening night film. The movie will also be opening at theaters in Israel at the end of September. 

The film festival will run this year from September 28 to October 7 at the Haifa Cinematheque and many other theaters in Haifa and will feature hundreds of films from all over the world, as well as the best of recent Israeli cinema.

The Israeli program has already been announced and more information will be coming soon about the rest of the program, which will include movies that have played at the Venice and Toronto film festivals, as well as many other festivals from all over the world. 

Guests of previous festivals have included Harvey Keitel, Brian Cox, Willem Dafoe, Brenda Blethyn, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Sophie Marceau, Joseph Fiennes, Paul Giamatti, and Elliott Gould. 

Jeanne du Barry, which was the opening-night film of the Cannes Film Festival this year, stars and was directed by Maiwenn, who also directed the films My King and Polisse. She portrays the title character, the daughter of a cook who became King Louis XV’s favored courtesan in France just before the French Revolution.

A new first for Johnny Depp

For the first time, Depp speaks French for an entire film as he portrays the sometimes thoughtful, sometimes rebellious monarch. The movie is Depp’s first in three years, a period during which he weathered a protracted court battle with his ex-wife, Amber Heard.

For more information about the festival, go to haifaff.co.il/eng