Khaby Lame will be part of the Cannes jury

In what is perhaps the most curious collaboration of the year, TikTok has become the official partner of the Cannes Film Festival - which, along with the Venice Film Festival, is the most prestigious film festival in Europe. For the occasion, the Chinese app has launched the #TikTokShortFilm category, which will see a series of short films filmed vertically no longer than 3 minutes and 30 seconds compete against each other, to be judged by a jury headed by Cambodian director Rithy Panh and including, as the only real tiktoker, Khaby Lame as well as other international filmmakers Basma Khalifa, Camille Ducellier and Angele Diabang.

The short films that will go into the competition will be chosen by a series of TikTok representatives around the world - a selection that will then be submitted to the Cannes jury. The awards ceremony for the top three short films will take place during the festival with an event attended by the president of the Cannes Film Festival, Thierry Frémaux. Among other things, TikTok will also partner with Brut, a digital-native company that, together with France Televisions, is Cannes' media partner, for some of the festival's side events.