Cannes Film Festival observes minute's silence for Manchester

Filmmakers and fans at Cannes held a minute's silence on Tuesday for the victims of the bombing of a pop concert in Manchester, condemned by the film festival's organisers as an "attack on culture, youth and joyfulness".

French actress Isabelle Huppert joined Cannes Film Festival Director Thierry Fremaux and his staff on the red-carpeted steps that usually host smiling movie stars heading to premieres.

"The people who were there last night at that music concert were doing exactly what we are doing here at Cannes ... being together, rejoicing in the freedom to love and sharing their passion," Fremaux said before the minute's silence.

Cannes was already under massive surveillance due to a deadly truck attack on revellers in Nice, just up the French Riviera coast, last July, and gun and bomb attacks on a music concert and football match in Paris in 2015.

Festival organisers expressed "horror, anger and immense sadness" at the suicide bombing that killed at least 22 people, including children, at a concert by U.S. singer Ariana Grande in Manchester, northern England, on Monday night.

Local police chief Yves Daros told Reuters about Cannes: "We are going to follow the procedures to the letter, without any deviation, to ensure this is going to be a safe festival."

But the bombing was already having an impact at the festival, one of the biggest global entertainment events.

An appearance by racing driver Lewis Hamilton to promote the Disney franchise "Cars" on Tuesday was cancelled "out of respect for the casualties and all of those impacted", according to the publicist.

Colin Farrell, in two of the biggest films in competition at Cannes, told Reuters the assault on a concert attended primarily by children and teenagers was "an attack against humanity and it's an attack against society and it's an attack against the hearts and lives and minds of innocent people".