With a half dozen filmmakers vying for the Palme d’Or next month (and worth mentioning actress turned director Hafsia Herzi made the move from the section with her debut 2019 Tu mérites un amour and into the Un Certain Regard section this year), Cannes Critic’s Week (the section dedicated to first and second time filmmakers only) has been uncovering filmmaker talent now for six decades. After last edition’s lost in a Covid sea, this will be Artistic Director Charles Tesson’s final year (some of our favorites from his programming committee mandate include Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy’s The Tribe, Julie Ducournau’s Raw and Léa Mysius’ Ava).
In this year’s comp we find one of our most anticipated directorial debut in Clara Roquet‘s Libertad (#77 on our most anticipated list) — up until this point she was a scribe on Carlos Marques-Marcet’s 10,000km (2014) and Jaime Rosales’ Petra (Directors’ Fortnight in 2018). We find Julie Lecoustre and Emmanuel Marre‘s Zero Fucks Given which stars Adèle Exarchopoulos a flight attendant working for a low-cost airline. Colombian helmer Simón Mesa Soto‘s Amparo has been mentioned in more than one convo for a possible Cannes showing and the same can be said for Khadar Ayderus Ahmed‘s The Gravedigger’s Wife (Le Fossoyeur). Completing the comp titles we also find Elie Grappe‘s Feathers, Omar El Zohairy‘s Olga and Laura Samani‘s Small Body.
Closing out the feature films we find other items we’ve been tracking/anticipating in Vincent Le Port‘s Bruno Reidal, Confessions of a Murderer (#112 in our most anticipated list), Samuel Theis‘ Petite Nature (#103 in our most anticipated list), Sandrine Kiberlain (actress and mom to filmmaker Suzanne Lindon – she was a Cannes 2020 label Cannes selection Spring Blossom) arrives with A Radiant Girl and Leyla Bouzid will close out the section with A Tale of Love and Desire(#61 in our most anticipated list). The section opens with Constance Meyer‘s Robuste – shot in Paris with a Gérard Depardieu like we’ve never seen him before. Worth noting are the short film selections headed by Léo Soesanto — films that are much better than those selected for the Palme d’Or line-up. Here they are:
In competition
Amparo by Simón Mesa Soto
Feathers by Omar El Zohairy
The Gravedigger’s wife by Khadar Ayderus Ahmed
Libertad by Clara Roquet
Olga by Elie Grappe
Piccolo Corpo (Small Body) by Laura Samani
Rien à foutre (Zero Fucks Given) by Julie Lecoustre & Emmanuel Marre
Special screenings
Robuste (Robust) by Constance Meyer – Opening Film
Bruno Reidal (Bruno Reidal, Confession of a Murderer) by Vincent Le Port
Petite Nature (Softie) by Samuel Theis
Une jeune fille qui va bien (A Radiant Girl) by Sandrine Kiberlain
Les Amours d’Anaïs (Anaïs in Love) by Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet – Film du 60e anniversaire
Une histoire d’amour et de désir (A Story of Love and Desir) by Leyla Bouzid – Closing Film
Short Films Competition
Brutalia, Days of Labour by Manolis Mavris
Duo Li (Lili Alone) by Zou Jing
Fang ke (An Invitation) by Hao Zhao & Yeung Tung
Inherent by Nicolai G.H. Johansen
Interfon 15 (Intercom 15) by Andrei Epure
Ma Shelo Nishbar (If It Ain’t Broke) by Elinor Nechemya
Noir-soleil by Marie Larrivé
Safe by Ian Barling
Soldat noir by Jimmy Laporal-Trésor
Über Wasser (On Solid Ground) by Jela Hasler
Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).
