Baku, May 19, AZERTAC
Indiana Jones star Harrison Ford received an honorary Palme d’Or for lifetime achievement at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, according to Hollywood Reporter.
Ford received the Palme d’or d’honneur on Thursday evening as he was at the festival to launch Lucasfilm’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. The veteran actor was visibly moved as he accepted a standing ovation and the special award presented by Cannes director Iris Knobloch.
“They say when you’re about to die, you see your life flash before your eyes, and I just saw my life flash before my eyes,” Ford said after seeing a reel filled with a lifetime of performances in popular movies play on the big screen behind him. As he accepted the award at the Grand Theatre Lumière, Ford gave shout-outs to his wife, Calista Flockhart; castmembers Mads Mikkelsen and Phoebe Waller-Bridge; and director James Mangold.
“I’m very moved by this… I’m so grateful to be able to work with artists like Jim, Phoebe, Mads, and I’m deeply moved by this honor,” Ford told the Cannes audience after being introduced by Cannes head Thierry Fremaux.
“But I got a movie you ought to see. It’s right behind me. So let me get out of the way and thank you again for this,” Ford added to one last rapturous round of applause from the festival audience.
Dial of Destiny marks the fifth time Ford has played professor and adventurer Indiana Jones. The film also comes 15 years after Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which also premiered in Cannes.
In the latest outing for the Indiana Jones franchise, Waller-Bridge stars as Indiana Jones’ goddaughter dragging the archeologist out of retirement.
Antonio Banderas, John Rhys-Davies, Shaunette Renée Wilson, Thomas Kretschmann, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Olivier Richters and Ethann Isidore also star in Dial of Destiny. This is the first Indiana Jones feature not to be directed by Steven Spielberg, who helmed four installments: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Temple of Doom (1984), The Last Crusade (1989) and Crystal Skull (2008).
Dial of Destiny picks up with Indiana Jones at age 70 (Ford is 80 in real life), and the film will acknowledge that this is an older, wearier character. Disney and Lucasfilm open the movie in theaters in late June.
Ford also attended Cannes in 1985 to tout his appearance in Peter Weir’s crime thriller Witness, in which he played a police detective called upon to protect an Amish woman (Kelly McGillis) and her son.