Cannes festival draws to a close

CANNES, France -- The Cannes film festival draws to a close on Sunday as award-winners are revealed by actress Liv Ullmann.

The end of the prestigious festival comes as one of the organisers bemoaned the lack of Hollywood stars attending the event.

Thierry Fremaux, who chooses films for the official Cannes competition, said a possible actors' strike had caused the situation because many U.S. studios had changed production schedules and prevented their stars from flying to France.

"This was a very unusual year," Fremaux told Reuters television in an interview.

"The threat of an actors' strike, which has been in the air since February and which prevented us for example from having Jodie Foster as head of our jury, was something that completely disfigured the face of the festival," he said.

Nicole Kidman had been at Cannes, but as well as Foster, Jack Nicholson and Cameron Diaz failed to show up along with a host of second-tier stars.

The U.S. actors guild is locked in negotiations with the studios over the renewal of the basic actors' contract, which expires on June 30.

A strike has been threatened unless more cash is made available to members of the guild, who earn between $30,000 and $70,000 a year when they are employed.

But Fremaux added: "There is so much myth surrounding Cannes that it was perhaps necessary this year to have a little less media effervescence in order to regain a sense of reality.

"What we want is that little by little, the great directors re-discover the pleasure of being here."