Cannes Theft: Vandal Tears Safe Off Hotel Room Wall During French Film Festival, Making Off With $1 Million Worth of Jewelry

By Jared Feldschreiber | May 17, 2013 02:01 PM EDT

During this year's Cannes Film Festival, a thief reportedly tore a safe off a hotel room wall and made off Friday with $1 million worth of jewels that stars were going to borrow for the red carpet at the most celebrated gathering in cinema, NBC News reported.

 A police source told NBC News that it was probably an inside job.

The source said that the safe was stolen from the hotel room of an American employee of Chopard, a Swiss luxury jeweler that has decked the likes of Julianne Moore in its glittering gems to show off at Cannes, news reports said.  The employee is responsible for jewelry for stars and was not in her room at the time, the source said.

The heist took place about 5 a.m, French media reported. French judicial police were investigating.

The jewelry house planned a news conference later Friday.

On its Facebook and Tumblr pages, Chopard features stars wearing its spectacular wares on the red carpet. Just Thursday, Moore wore a dazzling platinum necklace packed with 56 total carats of diamonds. The English model Cara Delevingne sported glittering Chopard chandelier earrings.

Police converged at the four-star Novotel. They began combing through surveillance footage and grilling potential witnesses about how the heist took place.

Ironically, one of the films premiering at this year's festival is Sofia Coppola's film "The Bling Ring," which is premiering at the fesitaval is about a group of teenagers who rob celebrity homes and brag about it on Facebook.

More Sections