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Marilyn Monroe Chosen as the Face of the 2012 Cannes Film Festival

The Cannes Film Festival has decided to pay homage to Marilyn Monroe this year by featuring the actress on its official poster. Celebrating the festival’s 65th anniversary, the poster features a black-and-white photo of a youthful Monroe blowing out a single candle on a birthday cake.

Organizers of the event, which begins this year on May 16, explained the choice in a statement today:

“Fifty years after her death, Marilyn is still a major figure in world cinema, an eternal icon, whose grace, mystery and power of seduction remain resolutely contemporary. The Festival poster captures Marilyn by surprise in an intimate moment where myth meets reality — a moving tribute to the anniversary of her passing, which coincides with the Festival anniversary. She enchants us with this promising gesture: a seductively blown kiss. The Festival is a temple of glamour and Marilyn is its perfect incarnation. Their coming together symbolizes the ideal of simplicity and elegance.”

(via Vanity Fair)