"The Best Director Award (Prix de la mise en scène) is an annual award presented at the Cannes Film Festival for best directing achievements in a feature film screened as part of festival's official selection. Awarded by festival's jury, it was first given in 1946".
"Multiple winners: 3 wins – Joel Coen (with Ethan Coen, non-credited) (1991, 1996, 2001), 2 wins – René Clément (1946, 1949), Sergei Yutkevich (1956, 1966), Robert Bresson (1957, 1983) and John Boorman (1970, 1998)".
"The winner of Best Director Award rarely wins the Palme d'Or, the main prize at the festival. This happened only twice, in 1991, when Joel Coen won both awards for "Barton Fink", and in 2003, when Gus Van Sant won for his film "Elephant".