Its screening program includes all 9 of her features, from Two Friends to The Power of the Dog, and a selection of her short films.

“For our 70th edition, we wanted to present a retrospective commensurate with the milestone, reflecting the audacious and boundary pushing filmmaking synonymous with our festival and region. There was no one more appropriate than Jane Campion,” said SFF director Nashen Moodley in notes ahead of the event.

Conducted largely in chronological order, the interview revealed that Campion’s broad-minded parents and Luis Bunuel, the master of surreal, had been significant influences. Campion recalled her mother taking her teenage daughter to Bunuel’s film about a housewife-prostitute “Belle de Jour.”

“Bunuel felt like a bolt of energy. Because he saw the world like I feel it too, It’s hard to be surreal and often apparently silly and funny. And, you know, I take myself quite seriously,” Campion said.

Both the stage interview and Bertucelli’s documentary cited the uncomfortable Cannes response to Campion’s 1989 film “Sweetie,” a tale of female best friends.

Mass walkouts at the festival premiere left the director feeling “completely humiliated,” only for her to find crumbs of comfort from the divisive and domineering Cannes talent scout Pierre Rissien, who reassured her that “the right people liked it.”

“I (still) love that film. It’s really a film that you make before you know what you’re doing. And in a way reveal some of your most intimate expressions,” said Campion.

Discussion of the overseas filming of “The Portrait of a Lady” saw Campion admit, “I don’t know where my comfort zone is, actually.”

Harvey Keitel

Campion described how Harvey Keitel (star of her “The Piano” and “Holy Smoke”) was “one of the first men that really opened up to me deeply and that I opened up to deeply. That’s really a gift. Across that gender separation,” she said.

The gap between men and women was the recurring theme in much of the on-stage talk and throughout Bertocelli’s documentary.

On stage, Campion explained how producers at Pathe UK had obliged her to make the ending of her “In the Cut” film less tragic than the Susanna Moore novel it was based on. “It’s really moving to still want to please the man in her dying moments,” said Campion.

In “Cinema Woman” there are several ‘gender’ references, some understated, some quietly outrageous. One shows Campion at the Oscars numbering off the more than 300 men to have received best director nominations, while the tally of women nominees could be counted on a single hand.

Campion is shown at Cannes’ 60th anniversary celebrations in the esteemed company of previous Palme d’Or winners. Campion is the only woman in the picture.

Further discussion about relations with key collaborators (Campion admitted to being scared of cinematographer Stuart Dryburgh); the exceptional material she discovered in Thomas Savage’s book “The Power of the Dog”; and only partially controlling the outcome when president of a festival jury.

“Sometimes you’re brokering deals to try and get the Palme d’Or and maybe the one that wins is actually not anybody’s first choice, but is everyone’s second choice,” Campion said after complimenting Cannes as “clean” and laudably free of backroom intrigue.

But questions from the audience inevitably returned to Campion as female director.

“Lead by inspiration, by what’s positive, what you love. Make that the biggest thing in your life and it will give you the strength to do what you want to do. Don’t bother with the rest. Try the lens of ‘I love this idea. I want to do it’,” she said.