Cannes’ Critics’ Week has unveiled the seven international filmmakers and three composers who are headed to Corsica for the third edition of its Next Step II programme. The Settlers‘ Felipe Galvez, The Maiden’s Graham Foy, Alma Viva’s Cristele Alves Meira, The Woodcutter Story’s Mikko Myllylahti, and Convenience Store’s Michael Borodin will be workshopping their sophomore feature projects alongside debut films by Yannick Casanova and Jela Hasler. The propose of the initiative is essentially match filmmakers with composers and explore the connection between the screenwriting process and musical composition. Here are the bios:
The class of 2025 includes Paris-based Chilean filmmaker Felipe Gálvez, who brings Impunity, a Spanish and English-language spy thriller set in 1998 around the arrest of dictator Augusto Pinochet in London produced by UK-Spain production house Rei Pictures and the UK’s Quiddity Films alongside France’s Les Films du Worso, Denmark’s Snowglobe and Chile’s Ronda Cine. Galves’ The Settlers premiered at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard in 2023 before going on to be Chile’s 2024 Oscars submission.
Canadian director Graham Foy is at work on his second feature Radio Radio about a five-year-old boy who has recurring nightmares about a man in a car crash who bears a strange family resemblance. FF Films and Taiga Pictures are producing. Foy’s first feature The Maiden played at a slew of festivals including Venice and TIFF.
Finnish filmmaker Mikko Myllylahti brings thriller The Mystery Of The Autumn Killer about a poet who is searching for a lost connection, a publisher trying to love a volatile artist, and a detective who must solve a series of strange cases to bring his lost partner back from another dimension, produced by Finland’s Aamu Film Company. Myllylahti’s The Woodcutter Story passed through Next Step before premiering at Critics’ Week in 2022. He also penned the script for Juho Kuosmanen’s The Happiest Day In The Life Of Olli Maki.
Portuguese-French director Cristele Alves Meira brings her second feature Joe about a young Portuguese immigrant who becomes a taxi driver and fixture of Pigalle’s lesbian nightlife scene as she searches for her mother. It is produced by France’s Les Films Pelleas, Take Shelter and Portugal’s O Som E A Furia. Meira’s debut feature Alma Viva, developed at Next Step, premiered at Critics’ Week in 2022 before going on to win five Sophia awards including best film at the Portuguese national film awards and represented Portugal at the Oscars.
Uzbekistan-born filmmaker Michael Borodin is en route with his second feature Seven Roads about two young women haunted by a ghost who embark on a deadly journey. Germany’s Einbahnstrasse Productions produces. His feature debut Convenience Store passed through Next Step before premiering at Berlin in 2022.
French filmmaker Yannick Casanova’s family drama Fortunatu is set in a mountain village in Corsica in the 1980s produced by France’s Les Films du Bal.
Swiss director Jela Hasler’s To Put Out One Fire is about a woman working at a Zurich parks department fighting to protect urban trees who clashes with local bureaucracy – produced by Switzerland’s Langfilm and Germany’s Trimafilm.
The selected composers are Harry Allouche, who has composed music for Galves’ The Settlers, Cesar Acevedo’s Horizonte and Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir’s A South Facing Window; Camille Delafon who composed the score for Gallien Guibert’s No One And Nothing which was nominated for the European Soundtrack awards and for Leo Favier’s documentary Miyazaki, The Spirit Of Nature; and Pierre Leroux who most recently composed the score for Martin Jauvat’s Baise-En-Ville which premiered at this year’s Cannes Critics’ Week.
Consultants are screenwriters Delphine Agut, Marie Amachoukeli and Julie Peyr, music supervisor Etienne Tricard and international sales veteran Agathe Valentin.
– follow IONCINEMA.com for in-depth updates on the world’s best film lab and film fund news!
2025 Critics’ Week Next Step II Programme: Felipe Galvez, Graham Foy, Cristele Alves Meira, Mikko Myllylahti & Michael Borodin Selected
2025-critics-week-next-step-ii-programme-felipe-galvez-graham-foy-cristele-alves-meira-mikko-myllylahti-michael-borodin
