This year’s Cannes Film Festival will see in competition Only God Forgives, the second film from Drive partnership Ryan Gosling and Nicolas Winding Refn and Steven Soderbergh’s Liberace biopic Behind the Candelabra.

Other films in the running for the coveted Palme d’Or include Roman Polanski’s Venus In Fur and Inside Llewyn Davis by Joel and Ethan Coen.

Steven Spielberg is the head of this year film festival’s jury.

Cannes Film Festival 2013 runs from 15^th to 26^th of May.

Ryan Gosling, currently starring in Beyond The Pines at the UK box office and Nicolas Winding Refn, who directed the controversial biopic of the “UK’s most violent prisoner” Charles Bronson, unveiled their previous film Drive at the film festival in 2011.

The violent thriller was nominated for the Palme d’Or but lost out to Terence Malick’s The Tree of Life. However, the film landed Nicolas Winding Refn the best director trophy.

Steven Soderbergh, who won Cannes’ top prize in 1989 for his film Sex, Lies and Videotape, is back in competition with his eagerly-awaited film Behind the Candelabra, starring Michael Douglas as the flamboyant entertainer Liberace, who masked his homosexuality from public view.

Matt Damon plays his gay lover in the film, made for cable channel HBO.

James Gray’s film The Immigrant, about a young woman tricked into a life of burlesque and vaudeville, stars Jeremy Renner, Joaquin Phoenix and Oscar-winner Marion Cotillard.

Inside Llewyn Davis is the upcoming film written and directed by the Coen brothers. Set in the 1960s, the film about a young folk singer, stars British actress Carey Mulligan and Justin Timberlake.

Alexander Payne, who sat on last year’s Palme d’Or jury, is in competition this year with his film Nebraska, about a father and son trekking from the state of Montana to Nebraska to claim some prize money.

Italian director Paolo Sorrentino, who directed Sean Penn as a faded rock star in This Must Be The Place, is in the running with his film The Great Beauty.

Controversial Japanese director Takashi Miike’s Straw Shield is a crime-thriller set in modern day politics while Iranian director, Asghar Farhadi – who won an Oscar for his film A Separation – directs The Artist actress Berenice Bejo in his new film The Past.

With other films in competition from Chad, China and Mexico, Cannes president Gilles Jacob said this year’s competition reflected “an attitude which, decade in decade out, guarantees the continuing existence of this institution. The idea is one I particularly like, and it sees the festival as a shelter for endangered artists”.

Outside of the films screening in competition are a number of other sections.

Harry Potter actress Emma Watson stars in The Bling Ring, the latest film from Sofia Coppola – based on the real-life robberies of celebrity homes in Malibu.

Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatbsy, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, will open this year’s Cannes Film Festival

The film will screen in the Un Certain Regard event, as will James Franco’s latest directorial effort As I Lay Dying.

The film is based on William Faulkner’s 1930 stream of consciousness novel, which is narrated by 15 different characters.

Baz Luhrmann’s anticipated The Great Gatbsy, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, will open the festival and the closing film is Zulu, a South African cop thriller starring Orlando Bloom and Forest Whittaker.

Jerry Lewis, the comedy star of the 1950s and 60s, who later poured his efforts into raising money for muscular dystrophy research, will get a special tribute at this year’s event.

Cannes 2013: Films in competition

Only God Forgives, director: Nicolas Winding Refn

Borgman, director: Alex Van Warmerdam

The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza), director: Paolo Sorrentino

Behind the Candelabra, director: Steven Soderbergh

Venus in Fur (La Venua a la Fourrure), director: Roman Polanski

Nebraska, director: Alexander Payne

Just 17 (Jeune & Jolie), director: Francois Ozon

Straw Shield (Wara No Tate), director: Takashi Miike

La Vie D’Adele, director: Abdellatif Kechiche

Like Father Like Son (Soshite Chichi Ni Naru), director: Kore-Eda Hirokazu

Tian Zhu Ding, director: Zhangke Jia

Grisgris, director: Mahamat-Saleh Haroun

The Immigrant, director: James Gray

The Past (Le Passe), director: Asghar Farhadi

Heli, director: Amat Escalante

Jimmy P (Un Indien des Plaines), director: Arnaud Desplechin

Michael Kohlhaas, director: Arnaud des Pallières

Inside Llewyn Davis, director: Joel and Ethan Coen

Un Chateau en Italie, director: Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi

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