CANNES, France -- A mongrel whose owner gets arrested for stealing dog food while on a road trip to Alaska on Friday scooped Cannes's unofficial canine award, the Palm Dog, the prize's jury president said.

Lucy the thespian pooch, a cross between a hunting dog and a retriever, even gets her name in the title of the US film: "Wendy and Lucy" by Kelly Reichardt.

"The film's got everything -- dog food, the dog pound and the dogged determination of a down and out," said jury president Toby Rose, a journalist who every year is joined by leading British film critics at Cannes to pick the best screen mutt.

Director Reichardt was due to pick up the prize -- a diamante collar with the words Palm Dog stitched into it -- on behalf of Lucy at a ceremony later Friday, said Rose.

The 2008 festival was a particularly good one for cinematic dogs, he said. noting that "it kicked off with a standout performance in 'Blindness,' where a dog licks Julianne Moore's face."

"Waltz With Bashir," an Israeli animated documentary also in the running for the official Palme d'Or top prize to be announced Sunday, which opens with a pack of snarling dogs hurtling through city streets, "shows dog camaraderie at its best," said Rose.

Last year the top canine prize was shared by a two-dimensional Austrian mutt and two real Thai canines. In 2006 it went to Mops, a doll-sized dog that featured in Sofia Coppola's "Marie Antoinette."