According to The Hollywood Reporter, Ron Howard's The Da Vinci Code will open the 59th Festival de Cannes on May 17, two days before the film is released worldwide, the festival's organizers said Saturday.

Based on the best-selling thriller by Dan Brown and produced by Brian Grazer and John Calley for Columbia Pictures and Imagine Entertainment, the film, which will be screened out of competition at Cannes, stars Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Jean Reno, Ian McKellen and Alfred Molina.

Da Vinci, which uses the Louvre Museum in Paris as one of its main backdrops, is an esoteric whodunit linked to a sinister plot to conceal the true meaning of the Holy Grail. The book, which has sold more than 30 million copies in about 40 languages, has been denounced by the Roman Catholic Church and historians as pure fiction with little or no historical basis.

The Da Vinci Code was released May 19th, 2006 and stars Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Ian McKellen, Jean Reno, Paul Bettany, Alfred Molina, Jürgen Prochnow, Jean-Yves Berteloot. The film is directed by Ron Howard.