A story behind the sport directed by U.S. filmmaker Bennett Miller was screened on Monday in Competition at the 67th Cannes Film Festival.

In the movie Foxcatcher, Miller's third feature film, the U.S. director examines "the tragic links" between John E. du Pont, a paranoid multimillionaire found guilty of murder, and two champion wrestlers.

The movie is mainly on an incident that took place in 1996: the murder of one of the two brothers, Olympic champion Dave Schultz, played in the movie by Mark Ruffalo, by the billionaire, played by Steve Carell.

The film's screenplay is based on the autobiography of Mark Schultz, played by Channing Tatum, the dead champion's brother, an Olympic champion in the same discipline in 1984.

"Bennett Miller's cinema aims to retrace real events and to focus on carefully selected aspects of the lives of the personalities he depicts, thus minimizing the purely chronological and fictionalized approach characteristic of the biopic," commented the official daily of the festival.

Miller has opted for a similar approach with Foxcatcher, exploring the inner depths of a true story.

"When I first got to know this story, I knew that there were messages in it that went beyond the story itself, and had something to say about us and our country," said Miller.

"It's not a political film, it's a film that tries to understand certain phenomena, such as decline," the director told reporters.

"We used a microscope to look at the inside of the story. You can understand the universe by using a telescope, but also at times by using a microscope," continued the director.

Meanwhile commenting on the movie, Carell said: "The film was exactly what Bennett had described to us at the beginning. We sometimes took detours but the film perfectly reflects the script."

The ongoing Cannes Film Festival opened here on Wednesday evening and will last till May 25.

A total of 18 films have been selected to compete for the Palme d'Or (Golden Palm), the top prize of the annual international film festival, as well as other prizes.

The winners will be announced on May 24, one day before the originally planned date due to the European Parliament elections on May 25.

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