Names and faces

■ With tensions around the war in Ukraine as a backdrop, the Cannes Film Festival plans a special honor for Tom Cruise’s “Top Gun” comeback and to host some 35,000 people as the movie industry looks to reclaim its pre-pandemic allure. On Thursday, organizers of this year’s festival unveiled the 18 films that will compete for the Palme d’Or prize at the May 17-28 event. They include “The Natural History of Destruction” by Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa, “All That Breathes” by Indian director Shaunak Sen and Ethan Cohen’s “Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind.” After a pandemic production delay, “Top Gun: Maverick,” in which Cruise reprises his 1986 role as a U.S. Navy pilot, will be showcased outside the official competition, along with Baz Luhrmann’s drama “Elvis.” The 75th anniversary of the French Riviera film extravaganza “is happening in special circumstances: the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, a world that has changed and will keep changing,” festival director Thierry Fremaux said. Cannes’ international village of flag-waving pavilions each year hosts more than 80 countries, but organizers said no Russian delegations would be welcome at the most global of film festivals this year because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Cannes is also showing a film about composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky by Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov, who recently fled Russia for Berlin, Fremaux said.

■ Oprah Winfrey and the Smithsonian Channel are partnering to highlight racial disparities in the health care system through a new campaign and documentary. The network Thursday announced the Color of Care campaign to work toward health equity. The campaign will follow the premiere of Winfrey’s “The Color of Care” documentary on May 1. Through Harpo Productions, Winfrey is executive producer of the documentary chronicling how people of color suffer from systematically substandard health care in the United States, with the covid-19 pandemic being a catalyst to shed light on the issue. The yearlong campaign will take a broader look at the topic, bringing together affected communities, medical and nursing schools, health care workers and policymakers in hopes of finding solutions. “The covid crisis has exposed gross inequalities in our health care system which, if left unaddressed, will again disproportionately impact people of color during the next health emergency,” said James Blue III, head of the Smithsonian Channel.

Winfrey

Cruise