George Lucas receives the Cannes Palme d’Or of Honor from Francis Ford Coppola

The director George Lucas received this Saturday the Palme d’Or of Honor at the Cannes Film Festival at the hands of another Hollywood legend, his friend Francis Ford Coppola, before an audience surrendered to the legacy of the creator of ‘Star Wars’.

Lucas, 80, was greeted with a long standing ovation at the Grand Lumière Theatre, which sounded even louder than the iconic soundtrack created by John Williams for the adventures of Luke Skywalker and company.

To the thunderous applause, Lucas responded by waving and giving a thumbs up.

From its first minute, the closing ceremony – which also served to crown ‘Anora’, by Sean Baker, as the best film of this 77th edition – was dedicated to the Californian creator, starting with a yellow lettering label that disappeared at the ends of the universe just like the ‘Star Wars’ movies.

“It is an honor to receive this award from Francis,” Lucas said on stage, after Coppola’s surprise appearance to present him with the honorary Palme.

The director of ‘The Godfather’, who himself was left without a prize in this edition of the French competition with his extravagant ‘Megalopolis’, assured that it was “exceptional” to be there “to pay tribute to imagination, success and perseverance.” of his friend.

He told how they met during college and that Lucas went to the filming of his first studio feature film in a T-shirt. When he asked him what he was watching, the man who would also become the producer of sagas like ‘Indiana Jones’ responded simply: “not much.”

“It has marked the history of cinema, of scripts, of commercial cinema”Coppola also noted about Lucas, “and now it continues in the country where it was born” the seventh art, in reference to France and the Lumière brothers.

He also recalled that in his career there were sad moments like when Lucas was rejected to adapt ‘Flash Gordon’. He then decided, Coppola recalled, to make his own space action movie, which he planned to call “Battle of Stars” or something like that.

Regarding Coppola, Lucas assured that he is “a great brother” who has always supported him. “I appreciate everything you have always done for me”he added.

The director of ‘American Graffiti’ thanked the Cannes Festival for the “honor” of receiving this award and remembered in his speech his regular collaborators, such as the American film editor and sound designer Walter Murch.

The day before, George Lucas had already given a talk in Cannes, in which he assured that the secret of his career has been “persistence” and passion for making films, something that interested him much more than making money.

With information from EFE