Rithy Panh, Shinji Aoyama and Pablo Fendrik Among Cannes’ 2010 L’Atelier Edition

Proving that the most difficult cinema to find financing for is national cinema (usually comprised with long takes, non-actors, low-budgets, cultural uniqueness, 35mm, and sublime cinematography), Cannes’ 2010 L’Atelier Edition, now in its 6th year, contains some surprising names in vets Shinji Aoyama (middle), Nabil Ayouch, Jaime Rosales and Rithy Panh (left). They’ll be joining the likes of the next generation of bold filmmakers – in total the Cinefondation selected 15 projects from 15 countries.

Among the names we know well, we have Pablo Fendrik (right) – a Cannes regular who presented his last picture Blood Appears, at the fest Bulgaria’s Javor Gardev who saw his film Zift make waves on the festival circuit last year, and Urszula Antoniak who cleaned up the Locarno International Film Festival with Nothing Personal (see trailer here).

A pair of names we should keep an eye on are Mexican helmer Diego Quemada-Diez who actually studied under Ken Loach and
Indonesia’s Edwin who was a Sundance lab participant earlier this year with Postcards from the Zoo. Show-Chun Lee, Károly Ujj Mészáros, Ruben Sierra Salles, Massoud Bakhshi, Srdan Golubovic and Hüseyin Karabey complete the list.

Alongside the producer(s) of their films, each director will meet in Cannes from May 14th to May 21st film industry professionals during the course of meetings that are presently being organized. I’m going to attempt to interview as many of these filmmakers during the festival – which I’ll be covering in depth in only 51 days from now.

Here is the complete list: 

The Ardor – Pablo Fendrik – Argentina – 3rd feature film
Zincograph – Javor Gardev – Bulgaria – 2nd feature film
Gibier d’élevage – Rithy Panh – Cambodia / France – 10th feature film
Dream and Silence – Jaime Rosales – Spain – 4th feature film
Shanghai – Belleville – Show-Chun Lee – France – 1st feature film
Liza, the Fox-Fairy – Károly Ujj Mészáros – Hungary – 1st feature film
Postcards from the Zoo – Edwin – Indonesia – 2nd feature film
Khorramshahr – Massoud Bakhshi – Iran – 2nd feature film
Decadent Sisters – Shinji Aoyama – Japan – 15th feature film
Les Etoiles de Sidi Moumen – Nabil Ayouch – Morocco – 4th feature film
La Jaula de Oro – Diego Quemada-Diez – Mexico – 1st feature film
Code Blue – Urszula Antoniak – Netherlands – 2nd feature film
Circles – Srdan Golubovic – Serbia – 3rd feature film
Come to my Voice – Hüseyin Karabey – Turkey – 2nd feature film
Lucia – Ruben Sierra Salles – Venezuela – 1st feature film