'Mr. Turner' Trailer: Timothy Spall Leads Mike Leigh's Cannes Hit

This year's Cannes Film Festival is just getting started, but it already seems to have one notable success story Mr. Turner. The Mike Leigh-directed biopic, which stars Timothy Spall as British painter J.M.W. Turner, has been attracting smashing reviews and even some early awards buzz following its world premiere this morning.

When the film will get a general U.S. release remains to be seen — crowded in with the other prestige dramas this fall, perhaps? — but for now you can feast your eyes on the first Mr. Turner trailer after the jump.

It's been only a few hours since Mr. Turner made its bow, but in that time it's picked up five-star reviews from The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Times, and Time Out London, as well as four-star reviews from CineVue and the London Evening Standard.

Total Film is wondering if it's "Leigh's masterpiece?" while THR thinks this is the role Spall "was born to play." On a more lighthearted note, Mr. Turner is also notable for inspiring this cheeky guide to Spall's every groan and grunt in the movie. Apparently, there are a lot of them.

Granted, the echo chamber of a festival isn't always the most accurate predictor of how a film will play among the general audience. But for now, Mr. Turner is certainly off to an auspicious start.

Here's the synopsis from Cannes:

'MR. TURNER' explores the last quarter century of the great if eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851).

Profoundly affected by the death of his father, loved by a housekeeper he takes for granted and occasionally exploits sexually, he forms a close relationship with a seaside landlady with whom he eventually lives incognito in Chelsea, where he dies. Throughout this, he travels, paints, stays with the country aristocracy, visits brothels, is a popular if anarchic member of the Royal Academy of Arts, has himself strapped to the mast of a ship so that he can paint a snowstorm, and is both celebrated and reviled by the public and by royalty.