The ARTE France Cinéma committee have thrown some pre-Holiday cheers towards some international co-productions that will for the most part begin filming next year for A-list film festival drops in 2027 and at the top of the list we find Quebecois filmmakers Charlotte Le Bon and Philippe Lesage grabbing our attention. Lesage’s I Just Want a Great Love Story has a major producer in Saïd Ben Saïd onboard with a cast that includes Lesage muse Théodore Pellerin, Stacy Martin, Félix Kysyl (of Misericordia fame) and veteran French actor Charles Berling. Production begins in April of next year. Le Bon’s much anticipated sophomore feature (currently using the working title of La Symphonie du Sens) landed Gabriel Lemire and Agathe Ledoux for what will be a Spring shoot in Montreal. Also on the fiction side we find Ukrainian filmmaker Kateryna Gornostai with Antonivka (it was at the 2024 Torino FilmLab). Production is set for late 2026 for the director of Timestamp (read review). Diana Cam Van Nguyen‘s feature debut continues with its forward momentum – after receiving the Prix ArteKino International at this year’s edition of Rotterdam, InBetween Worlds is set for a July shoot in Prague and Hanoi.
Also landing coin we find Casa Susanna filmmaker (read review) Sébastien Lifshitz getting help for Je m’appelle Sophie Calle et je suis encore vivante and Cannes Film Festival favorite Sergei Loznitsa will be working on Imperium. Here are all the projects:
Tandem (France), Metafilms (Canada)
Starring Gabriel Lemire and Agathe Ledoux
After her widely acclaimed Falcon Lake (Louis-Delluc Award for Best First Film), the Quebecois actress and screenwriter once again turns her attention to troubled childhood and the ghosts of the past, elevating memories of her own youth. Sam, 10, sees her father Richard reappear after a long absence. The reassuring world she shared with her mother and stepfather begins to falter. Richard, with his excesses and fragilities, disrupts her sense of stability. In this tender disorder, will Sam be able to preserve her inner light?
Filming scheduled for spring 2026 in Montreal.
Antonivka by Kateryna Gornostai
Damned Films (France), Moon Man (Ukraine), Just a Moment (Lithuania)
In the near future, Aurora and Darko leave Kyiv to settle in the countryside with Anton, Aurora’s grandfather, who has been weakened by a stroke. While Aurora, absorbed by her work as a veterinarian, is less present at home, Darko quickly integrates, forming close bonds with Anton and the village’s youth. A new cerebral attack suffered by Anton upsets the household’s fragile balance and reignites tensions, particularly with the arrival of Aurora’s mother. At the heart of their daily lives, Anton’s presence becomes essential and unifying.
Filming scheduled for late 2026.
I Just Want a Great Love by Philippe Lesage
SBS Productions (France), Les Films de l’Autre (Canada)
Starring Théodore Pellerin, Stacy Martin, Félix Kysyl, Charles Berling
Guillaume, a passionate and idealistic young man, struggles to find his place in life. When his older sister Charlotte—who supports his uncompromising artistic dreams—invites him to spend a few days with her fiancé’s family in a quiet village in Bas-Saint-Laurent, the meeting of the two families leads to life-changing moments for everyone involved.
Filming scheduled from late April to mid-June 2026 in Canada.
InBetween Worlds by Diana Cam Van Nguyen (first feature)
Tripode Productions (France), 13ka (Czech Republic), Nutprodukcia (Slovakia)
Starring Soňa Lê and David Petrželka
Torn between her Vietnamese origins and her Czech upbringing, Mai, a photography student in Prague, must make a life-altering choice when her parents arrange a marriage to secure the family’s future. Caught between duty and desire, Mai is forced to confront her identity, her love, and her place between two worlds.
Filming scheduled from July to September 2026 in Prague and Hanoi.
Je m’appelle Sophie Calle et je suis encore vivante
Documentary by Sébastien Lifshitz
Agat Films (France)
After more than 40 years of creation, Sophie Calle has become one of the most internationally renowned French artists. For the first time, she has agreed to be followed by a camera over several months, allowing it to film her daily life, her work, and her intimate spaces. The film also retraces her journey from the 1970s — when nothing suggested she would become an artist — to the present day, as she has just received the prestigious Praemium Imperiale from the Emperor of Japan. Sophie Calle has navigated the art world through intimate narratives that stage her own life, obsessions, and anxieties, ultimately embodying with humor and depth the torments of the human condition.
Imperium, documentary film by Sergei Loznitsa
Essential Filmproduktion (Germany), Société Parisienne de Production (France), Kino Produzioni (Italy), Studio Uljana Kim (Lithuania)
A visual journey across the vast expanse of the Soviet Union, composed exclusively of archival footage shot between 1970 and 1973 by a group of Italian filmmakers. From nomadic camps in Central Asia to Red Square, from remote Caucasian villages to the far reaches of the Far East, the film reveals a mosaic of cultures that the regime sought to standardize. Without voice-over or commentary, the images capture landscapes, rituals, and scenes of everyday life, offering a raw look at the diversity and resilience of worlds often left on the margins of the Soviet empire’s drive toward modernization. Imperium thus proposes a rereading of the history of a vanished empire, revealing through these rare and unofficial images the cultural and centrifugal fractures whose echoes still resonate today.
Prudence, animated feature by Jérémie Hoarau
Everybody On Board (France), Kaibou (Quebec)
In the near future, Ina and Claude, a couple of technical deep-sea divers, descend 200 meters below the surface to join the crew of an underwater station on a last-chance mission to contain a catastrophic oil spill. Working in confinement, cut off from the world and under extreme conditions, the ship’s doctor becomes infected by a parasitic worm.
Start of production: May 2026 // delivery: summer 2027
Isis et Osiris, animated feature by Fabrice Luang-Vija
Fargo / JPL Films (France), Kinotopia (Romania), Praça Filmes (Portugal)
In Egypt, at the dawn of humanity, the god Osiris and the goddess Isis share an infinite love. They rule over humankind with great benevolence and live among them. Egypt is prosperous and fertile. But Seth, a dry and jealous god who reigns over the desert, plots against them. During a feast, he traps Osiris in a chest and drowns him in the Nile. Drought strikes the land, and Seth seizes power. Desperate, Isis sets out in search of the chest to recover her husband. A long quest begins along the Nile, where the fate of Egypt will be decided, and where love must triumph over Death to complete Creation…
Start of production: late 2026 // delivery: early 2029
