Bellocchio to get career Palme d'Or

(ANSA) - ROME, JUN 22 - Italy's Marco Bellocchio is to to get a career Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival on July 6-17, organizers said Tuesday, joining Jodie Foster as this year's two recipients of the honour.
    Bellocchio, 81, whose films include Fists in the Pocket, The Prince of Homburg, The Nanny, The Religion Lesson, Win, Dormant Beauty and The Traitor, will receive the award along with Foster on the final evening of the fest.
    The cult and engagé director will also present his latest work, Marx Can Wait, in the Cannes Premiere section of the fest.
    A friend of late cinema great Pier Paolo Pasolini, Bellocchio's other films include China is Near (1967), Sbatti il mostro in prima pagina (Slap the Monster on Page One) (1972), Nel Nome del Padre (In the name of the Father - a satire on a Catholic boarding school that shares affinities with Lindsay Anderson's If....) (1972), Victory March (1976), A Leap in the Dark (1980), Henry IV (1984), Devil in the Flesh (1986), and My Mother's Smile (2002), which told the story of a wealthy Italian artist, a 'default-Marxist and atheist', who suddenly discovers that the Vatican is proposing to make his detested mother a saint.
    In 1991 he won the Silver Bear - Special Jury Prize at the 41st Berlin International Film Festival for his film The Conviction.
    In 1995 he directed a documentary about the Red Brigades and the kidnapping of Aldo Moro, entitled Broken Dreams. In 2003, he directed a feature film on the same theme, Good Morning, Night.
    In 2006 his film The Wedding Director was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival.
    In 2009 he directed Vincere (Win), which was in the main competition at the Cannes Film Festival. He finished Sorelle Mai, an experimental film that was shot over ten years with the students of six separate workshops playing themselves. He was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 68th Venice International Film Festival in 2011.
    His 2012 film Dormant Beauty was selected to compete for the Golden Lion at the 69th Venice International Film Festival.
    Bellocchio condemned the Catholic Church's interference in politics after the premiere of his latest controversial film, which was about a high-profile euthanasia and right-to-die case, involving Eluana Englaro. (ANSA).