The 78th edition of the upcoming Cannes Film Festival turns yellow and black. From Chile to Spain, from Italy to Egypt and Japan, new TFL titles are getting ready to premiere on the big screen at the prestigious French festival. Could we be more proud?
OFFICIAL COMPETITION – which for the first time ever includes 2 #TFLFILMS:
RENOIR by Chie Hayakawa (FeatureLab 2023, winner of the TFL Co-Production Award 50,000 euros, supported by Creative Europe MEDIA)
A quirky 11-year-old, her dying father and stressed mother thirst for human connections in Tokyo.
ROMERÍA by Carla Simón (TFL Next 2020 – with her previous TFL-developed project, Alcarràs, she won the Golden Bear at Berlinale 2022)
Marina, 18, orphaned at a young age, must travel to Spain’s Atlantic coast to obtain a signature for a scholarship application from the paternal grandparents she has never met. She navigates a sea of new aunts, uncles, and cousins, uncertain whether she will be embraced or met with resistance. Stirring long-buried emotions, reviving tenderness, and uncovering unspoken wounds tied to the past, Marina pieces together the fragmented and often contradictory memories of the parents she barely remembers.
Competing as well are two other features from alumni:
SIRAT by Oliver Laxe (who joined TFL in 2011 with his first film Mimosas, premiered at Cannes in 2016)
A father, accompanied by his son, goes looking for his missing daughter in North Africa.
ALPHA by Julia Ducournau (who realised her debut film Raw through the lab in 2013, premiered at Cannes in 2016)
Alpha, 13, is a troubled teenager who lives alone with her mother. Their world comes crashing down the day she comes home from school with a tattoo on her arm.
UN CERTAIN REGARD – 3 TFL debut features:
THE CARAVAN by Zuzana Kirchnerová (ScriptLab 2018 and FeatureLab 2020, winner of the Production Award 40,000 euros)
Ester (40) is a single mother of a mentally disabled son David. She only has one small dream: to spend two weeks in Italy at her old-time friend´s house without her son. At the last moment, the plans change and she has no other option than to take David with her.
THE MYSTERIOUS GAZE OF THE FLAMINGO by Diego Céspedes (FeatureLab 2020, winner of the Co-production Award 50,000 euros, supported by Creative Europe MEDIA)
1982. As an unknown disease begins to spread in a small mining town in the Chilean desert, gay men are accused of transmitting it through their eyes. Twelve-year-old Lidia, the only girl in the community, sets out in search of the truth.
AISHA CAN’T FLY AWAY by Morad Mostafa (Red Sea Lodge nel 2022)
The underworld of African migrant society in Cairo and the tension between the different groups as witnessed by Aisha, a Sudanese caregiver.
And by our alumnus:
Un Poeta by Simón Mesa Soto (who directed the TFLfilm AMPARO, which premiered at Cannes – Semaine de la Critique in 2021)
Oscar Restrepo’s obsession with poetry brought him no glory. Aging and erratic, he has succumbed to the cliché of the poet in the shadows. Meeting Yurlady, a teenage girl from humble roots, and helping her cultivate her talent brings some light to his days, but dragging her into the world of poets may not be the way
Plus we've got a special screening within the Official Selection:
MAMA by Or Sinai (ScriptLab 2020, FeatureLab 2021 winner of the Production Award)
After many years working far from home, Mila is forced to temporarily leave her seaside mansion—and her secret romance—to return to her family in a remote Polish village. But the long-awaited reunion is far from what she imagined.
As for the SEMAINE DE LA CRITIQUE... we wish to congratulate with:
SLEEPLESS CITY by Guillermo Galoe (ScriptLab 2020)
Toni, a 15-year-old Roma boy, lives in the largest illegal slum in Europe, on the outskirts of Madrid. Proud to belong to his family of scrap dealers, he follows his grandfather everywhere. But when demolition companies start closing in on their land, the family is divided: while some decide to move to the city, his grandfather refuses to abandon their land. Night after night, Toni must make a choice: leap into an uncertain future, or hang on to the world of his childhood.
Finally, presented within the Directors' Fortnight:
MILITANTROPOS by our alumna Yelizaveta Smith with Alina Gorlova and Simon Mozgovyi
Militantropos (lat. «milit» – soldier; gr. «antropos» – human) – a persona adopted by humans when entering a state of war. Militantropos chooses to accept war as the one and only option to exist.
In the picture, a still from ROMERÍA.