Cannes 2021: who will win the Palme d’Or – and who should

As a very strange edition of the festival draws to a close, our film critic predicts who will walk away with the Palme d'Or and other prizes - and awards his own alternative Braddies

So it actually happened - the Cannes film festival defiantly took place in the era of Covid, and two months later than usual, in sweltering July. More tourists, but fewer actual festival-attenders from the media. Some streets were eerily quiet and the legendary bar, Le Petit Majestic, usually packed with movie-world people, getting drunk, exchanging cards and crowding densely out into the street every night until three in the morning, was doing hardly any business.

Masks were worn throughout all films, though not on the hallowed red carpet, and every 48 hours we had to report to a special tent for Covid testing: it was not possible to enter the Palais without having the vital QR code for Negatif" on your phone. The whole business was a bit laborious and discombobulating but this was a great logistical triumph for the festival. The only Covid casualty was the French star Lea Seydoux, who couldn't come, having tested positive.