Emma Watson flashes a hint of midriff in a flirty feathered outfit at The Bling Ring photocall in Cannes

She tweeted earlier this month that she was excited about the opportunity to showcase a selection of stunning outfits during her time in Cannes.

And Emma Watson certainly kicked things off in style on Thursday as she arrived for The Bling Ring photocall at the film festival in a stunning Christopher Kane ensemble.

The 23-year-old actress flashed a hint of midriff in the matching crop top and above the knee skirt, which featured feather detailing along the hem.

Flirty in feathers: Emma Watson opted for a Christopher Kane feather-trimmed top and skirt at The Bling Ring photocall in Cannes on Thursday

Smiles all round: The maroon colour of the ensemble highlighted Emma’s English Rose complexion

The look is significantly more demure than Emma has been opting for in recent months, with a long length on the skirt and high neck on the top.

The maroon colour of Emma’s outfit flattered her English rose complexion, and she added a sophisticated touch to the outfit with a pair of sky-high black suede court shoes.

Emma finished off her look by wearing her brunette hair swept back into a loose bun.

Flawless: Emma kept her make-up simple for the occasion and wore her brunette hair swept back into a low bun

Photogenic from every angle: Emma looked confident but demure as she made her way into the event

Emma studied the dark side of celebrity culture to play her latest role as a burglar.

The actress who shot to fame in the Harry Potter movies gave what amounted to a studied analysis of how social media drives the celebrity age.

Sofia Coppola’s film is based on a real-life Los Angeles gang that broke into the homes of celebrities such as Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan.

Emma revealed she watched ‘a lot of the Kadashians and Paris Hilton’ on tv because she wanted to understand the psychology of her character.

‘I needed to understand and emphasise with her, and get the accent down’, Emma told a press conference in Cannes.

Changing style: Emma’s sense of fashion has certainly improved over the years. Left, in 2001, and right, on Thursday

The stars of the show: Emma looked somewhat stiff as she posed next to the film’s director Sofia Coppola

Co-stars: Emma with her fellow stars of the film (left to right) Katie Chang, Taissa Fariga, Israel Broussard and Claire Julien

She said that she also wanted to explore the girl’s parenting and environment.

Emma said she felt the gang broke into the homes of celebrities more to party than to steal.

‘It wasn’t so much about the heist aspect , they wanted to pretend that for two hours they were in Paris Hilton’s home.They wanted to party’, she observed.

She added that technology is also a big part of what drives celebrity culture and the desire for young people to be like the stars they see in magazines, tabloids and on Twitter and Facebook.

‘We’re being saturated by images ‘, she noted.

‘And in a sense they become whatever they project onto that image, whatever it is.

‘I also think that if you look through OK magazine and tabloids they look like comic strips and it’s a narrative our society has become obsessed with,’ she said.

Taking it all in: The photocall comes ahead of a screening of the film at the film festival on Thursday night

At the same time Emma wondered what social media was doing to childhoods.

She explained that young people who use social media become more self aware at a much younger age because of ‘all the posturing’ they do on social networks.

‘They’re blissfully unaware their childhoods are being shortened’, the actress said.

The Bling Ring was shot in the style of the world it encompasses where the kids who broke into the homes of celebrities would present their bounty on Facebook and other image sharing sites.

Coppola explained that the brains of the kids involved ‘weren’t fully formed’ because they didn’t pay much attention to security cameras nor were they concerned about finger prints, they just wanted to score some bling.