Director Ron Howard and the cast of "Solo: A Star Wars Story" brought the latest spinoff to the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday. They were greeted by the media and fans as they arrived for a Cannes photo call in the early afternoon.

"Solo" takes audiences back to the youth of the smuggler, ace pilot and charming scoundrel, Han Solo, played by Harrison Ford in the original 1977 "Star Wars" movie.

Alden Ehrenreich, 28, a relative newcomer, plays the young Han Solo, who is one of the franchise's most popular characters.

The film also stars Emilia Clarke, Paul Bettany, Woody Harrelson and Thandie Newton.

Oscar-winning filmmaker Howard stepped in after the film's production was thrown into upheaval by the surprise departure of its directors.

Original directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, best known for "The Lego Movie", were fired in June 2017, because of what were described as creative differences.

The "Solo" spin-off is part of Walt Disney Company's expanding slate of "Star Wars" movies, which were rebooted by the 2015 blockbuster hit, "Star Wars: The Force Awakens".

Fans of high school musical "Grease" are in for a treat if they can make it to the French Riviera this week.

The movie will be screened on the beach on Wednesday to celebrate its 40th anniversary. And fans might get a glimpse of its star, John Travolta, who is back in Cannes promoting his new film, "Gotti", about a New York gangster.

In 1978, Travolta, already a global sensation thanks to "Saturday Night Fever", came to the Cannes Film Festival to promote "Grease", a huge hit that also made him a music star with songs from the soundtrack dominating the charts.

Cult crime flick "Pulp Fiction" won Cannes' Palme d'Or award in 1994, giving a second wind to Travolta's career. When asked "does it feel like 40 years?", Travolta says:

JOHN TRAVOLTA ACTOR No. "Because in the mid point was 'Pulp Fiction'. So it was 40 years, 20 years and now today. My mother always said when I was younger 'Don't rush things. As you get older it's going to go very fast' and boom here I am and it's gone very fast! I've lived a full life but it has really gone very fast."

In his new film, Travolta plays John Gotti, a gangster boss who dies in 2002. Travolta's wife, Kelly Preston, co-stars as Gotti's wife and the mother of their son who refuses to follow his father into the mob.

When their younger son is killed in a car accident, the pair are devastated, scenes which Preston said were hard to shoot. Preston and Travolta's oldest son, Jett, died in 2009 at age 16 from a seizure.

KELLY PRESTON ACTRESS "It was hard. It was hard, I didn't know what, I kind of tried not to think about it prior, I just knew I would be able to do it and I decided to just go there for the time being and to separate myself if that makes sense. I couldn't. I had to be playing a part but completely immersed in with it being completely familiar, if that makes sense. So I went there and just felt very raw and exposed."

The Cannes Film Festival runs until Saturday.