Fernando Meirelles' Blindness is to open the Cannes Film Festival and will join the Competition line-up, it has been confirmed.

The film, about a city hit with a plague causing most of the population to go blind, was adapted by Don McKellar from the novel by Jose Saramago.

The cast is led by Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Danny Glover and Gael Garcia Bernal.

Last week, when the official line-up was announced, many industry observers questioned why Blindness had not been included.

Focus Features is handling sales on the film.

Cannes has added two other titles to the Competition.

  • Laurent Cantet's Entre Les Murs, based on the book by Francois Begaudeau, and produced by Haut et Court which will release it in October.
  • And James Gray's Two Lovers, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow.

The main competition jury has added two members - French actress Jeanne Balibar and Iranian author-director Marjane Satrapi - under the presidency of Sean Penn. Satrapi took the Jury Prize at Cannes last year for her Persepolis. The film went on to garner an Oscar nomination.

Finally, the festival announced that Barry Levinson's What Just Happened will be the event's closing night film.

The Sundance title stars Robert De Niro, Bruce Willis, Robin Wright Penn and John Turturro. The Palme d'Or will be awarded by De Niro on May 25 ahead of the film's screening.

Updated competition line-up

Laurent Cantet - Entre Les Murs (France)

Nuri Bilge Ceylan - Three Monkeys (Turkey-France-Italy)

Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne - Le Silence De Lorna (Belgium-France-Italy-Germany)

Arnaud Desplechin - A Christmas Story (France)

Clint Eastwood - Changeling (US)

Atom Egoyan - Adoration (Canada)

Ari Folman - Waltz With Bashir ( Israel-France-Germany )

Philippe Garrel - La Frontiere De L'Aube ( France )

Matteo Garrone - Gomorra ( Italy )

James Gray -Two Lovers (US)

Charlie Kaufman - Synecdoche, New York (US)

Eric Khoo - My Magic (Singapore)

Lucretia Martel - La Mujer Sin Cabeza (Argentina-Spain)

Brillante Mendoza - Serbis (The Philippines)

Fernando Meirelles - Blindness (Brazil)

Kornel Mondruczo - Delta (Hungary-Germany)

Walter Salles & Daniela Thomas - Linha De Passe (Brazil)

Paolo Sorrentino - Il Divo (Italy)

Pablo Trapero - Leonera (Argentina-South Korea)

Wim Wenders - The Palermo Shooting (Germany-Italy)

Jia Zhangke - 24 City (China )

Steven Soderbergh - Che (US-Spain-France) - one four-hour competion title comprised of Guerrilla and The Argentine

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