"The film is a Paris classroom drama-documentary based on a novel by Francois Begaudeau, who plays a teacher in the film working in a tough Parisian neighbourhood.  

Screen's four-star review describes it as offering "a rich microcosm of today's multi-ethnic French population."

Jury president Sean Penn said the decision to give the award to Cantet's "amazing, amazing film" was unanimous.

It was the first Palme D'Or win for a French film since Maurice Pialat's Sous Le Soleil De Satan in 1987"