News

Jacques Audiard’s musical film Emilia Pérez is the frontrunner at the nomination stage for the 30th edition of France’s Lumière awards.

The prizes, which are regarded as the French equivalent of the Golden Globes, will be voted on by members of the international press hailing from 38 countries this year.

They cover 13 categories spanning film, direction, screenplay, actress, actor, female revelation, male revelation, first film, animation, documentary, international co-production, cinematography and music.

Audiard’s Cannes Jury Prize winner Emilia Pérez has clinched six nominations, followed by Boris Lojkine’s Souleymane’s Story, which won the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize this year, and Alain Guiraudie’s Misericordia, with five nominations each.

Other frontrunners with four nominations each, include François Ozon’s When Fall Is Coming and Jonathan Millet’s Ghost Trail.

The winners will be announced in a ceremony at the Forum des images in Paris on January 20, 2025.

The full...

Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez has topped the nominations for France’s Lumière Awards.

The French-made, Spanish-language film earned six nominations for best film, director, screenplay, cinematography, music and actress for Karla Sofía Gascón in her starring role as the titular transitioning Mexican drug lord.

The Lumière nominations cap a strong week for Emilia Perez, which garnered 10 nominations for the 2025 Golden Globes,and was the big winner at the European Film Awards with five prizes.

Scroll down for full list of nominees

Boris Lojkine’s Souleymane’s Story, which tracks the daily life of an undocumented Guinean asylum seeker in Paris,...

They say third time’s a charm, and that can be true of our third visit to the Estonian capital city of Tallinn, for the annual Black Nights Film Festival. Taking place every November, HeyUGuys were fortunate enough to be invited back to celebrate all things cinema, in one of our stand-out events of the film calendar.

With the city prepping for the festive period, the wooden shacks in the old town square readying themselves to fill up tourists and locals alike with mulled wine – before the Christmas spirit engulfs the city, comes a festival that offers a uniquely diverse programme of films from around the world, showcasing stories from filmmakers both old and new, from such a myriad of fascinating voices.

Though our stay was sadly somewhat brief, during our four-day visit we still managed to get a flavour of the festival without having an all-encompassing experience, but even during our limited stay,...

Zum jährlichen Gedenktag an die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus am 27. Januar ruft die Stiftung Erinnerung, Verantwortung und Zukunft (Evz) erstmalig einen Kinotag mit Titel „Augen auf“ ins Leben. Ab 2026 soll aus dem Ein-Tag-Event eine ganze Filmwoche werden.

Der „Augen auf“-Kinotag findet am 27. Januar 2025 statt (Credit: Evz)

In drei Städten, nämlich Berlin, Frankfurt am Main und Rostock, findet am 27. Januar 2025, dem jährlichen Gedenktag an die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus, der „Augen auf“-Kinotag statt. Initiiert wird er von der Stiftung Erinnerung, Verantwortung und Zukunft (Evz). In diesem Rahmen werden u.a. die Filme „A Real Pain“ von Jesse Eisenberg sowie „Das kostbarste aller Güter“ von Michel Hazanavicius gezeigt sowie auch ein Schulkinoprogramm mit u.a. „In Liebe, eure Hilde“ von Andreas Dresen und „Als Hitler das rosa Kaninchen stahl“ von Caroline Link. Flankiert wird der Tag mit Podiumsdiskussionen. Es werden Filme kuratiert, die sich auf unterschiedliche Weise mit der Ns-Geschichte und dem Holocaust auseinandersetzen,...

The Valladolid International Film Festival, Seminci, will take place for the 69th time this fall, running Oct. 18-26.

To prepare, we’ve scanned the festival’s catalog for ten standout titles that attendees won’t want to miss at this year’s event. Below, we explain why each is a must-see proposition at this year’s Semicni.

“They Will Be Dust,” Carlos Marques-Marcet (Spain)

Opening this year’s festival is Carlos Marques-Marcet’s Toronto Platform winner, “They Will Be Dust.” In this tragicomic musical, a woman diagnosed with a terminal illness decides to go to Switzerland to end her life, accompanied by her partner of 40 years, Flavio. Seminci organizers praise the film as “an unexpected celebration of life itself and of the unconditional love of those who accompany us along the way.”

“Vermiglio,” Maura Delpero

Italy’s submission to the upcoming International Feature Oscar race, Maura Delpero’s intimate epic “Vermiglio,...

Carlos Marques-Marcet’s Toronto-winning musical drama They Will Be Dust, will open the 69th edition of the Valladolid International Film Week, also known as the Seminci, on October 18.

The end of life drama starring Alfredo Castro and Angela Molina won the Platform section at TIFF last month.

Valladolid, headed by José Luis Cienfuegos for a second year, is a key launchpad into the Spanish market for local and international films.

There are a total of 22 titles in the running for the festival’s top prize, the Golden Spike that comes with a €70,000 award for the Spanish distributor. The Silver Spike...

The 16th edition of the Lumière Film Festival kicked off in high style, with a glittering lineup of stars including Benicio del Toro, Tim Burton, Monica Bellucci and Vanessa Paradis plus high-profile directors Costa-Gavras and Giuseppe Tornatore gracing the red carpet in Lyon.

Bellucci, who’s in town to present a new documentary about the stage play in which she portrays Maria Callas, was among the last to take to the red carpet. After taking a few steps, she turned back with a playful gesture as if she had forgotten something, reached through the curtain, and drew out Tim Burton, to the delight of the 5,000-strong crowd: Burton’s unannounced appearance drew massive applause.

The pair famously met and fell in love in Lyon in 2022, when Burton was the recipient of the festival’s lifetime achievement Lumière Award, which was handed to him by Bellucci. The Italian actress has since...

Studiocanal France has revealed the main official French trailer for the film titled The Most Precious of Cargoes, an animated tale from WWII about a Jewish baby rescued by a compassionate Polish woodcutter and his wife. This premiered at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival as one of the final films at the end of the fest. In war-torn times, a poor woodcutter and his wife live in a great forest in Poland. One day, the woman finds and rescues a baby girl, bringing irrevocable change to the lives of the couple, and to those whose paths the child will cross. The story follows a Holocaust-surviving Jewish girl whose father throws her from a moving train heading to Auschwitz who is luckily found and raised by these two people. The voices include Jean-Louis Trintignant as the narrator, Grégory Gadebois as the woodcutter, with Denis Podalydès and Dominique Blanc. The stunning animation is really the star of this,...

The American French Film Festival unveiled the full-line up of its upcoming edition at a press conference at the Résidence de France in Beverly Hills on Wednesday, as the event returns after a one-year hiatus due to the Hollywood strikes.

The 28th edition, running October 29 to November 3 in the Director’s Guild of America Theatre Complex, will showcase 60 films and series, with 14 shorts, 14 Series and TV movies, and 32 feature films and documentaries, many of which are International, North American and U.S. premiere presentations.

As previously announced the event will be book-ended by Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez as the opening film and The Count of Monte Cristo, which will close the event.

The American French Film Festival was created and is produced by the Franco-American Cultural Fund, a collaboration between the Directors Guild of America (DGA), the Motion Picture Association (MPA), France’s Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers...

French-speaking Belgium hit a high-water mark at the Cannes Film Festival in May, with 11 Belgian co-productions claiming accolades and acclaim across the Croisette. Alongside Critics’ Week opener “Ghost Trail” and the Cannes jury and best actress prize-winner “Emilia Pérez,” eight of those co-productions received support from Belgium’s Federation Wallonie-Bruxelles, while just as many shared a proud Francophone voice.

At Venice, industry delegates built on that robust show of force, touting home-grown projects like Fabrice Du Welz’s police thriller “Maldoror” and co-productions like Aude Léa Rapin’s sci-fi drama “Planet B” and Marie Losier’s music doc “Peaches Goes Bananas,” while young producers took to the Lido to forge new partnerships beyond the traditional mold.

“We’re trying to diversify as much as possible,” says French-speaking Belgium’s Cinema and Audiovisual Center director Jeanne Brunfaut. “Though we tend to partner with [other Francophone countries], we want to encourage our producers to look further afield,...

Adding to its new scripted TV offer, France TV Distribution is launching sales on Season 2 of Ocs Signature drama-comedy “The Aerobics Project” (“Toutouyoutou”), a fun, light dramedy set in a 1982 France in thrall of American pop culture, including aerobics.

Created by writing team Maxime Donzel and Géraldine de Margerie as well as David Coujard, the first season of “The Aerobics Project” began with dowdy fortysomething housewife Karine (Claire Dumas), living in Blagnac, a humdrum suburb of Toulouse, southern France, save for being the birthplace of French aeronautics. One day she stumbles open-mouthed on an aerobics class taught be a rangy instructor Jane (aLEXIA Barlier), who’s just arrived from the U.S. and takes a large interest in Project 37, a top-secret program run by Karine’s husband at the local aeronautics company.

By Season 2, Karine has rumbled Jane as an industrial spy, has taken a job at the company and...

Michel Hazanavicius, the Oscar-winning director of “The Artist” whose animated film “The Most Precious of Cargoes” competed at this year’s Cannes and was subject to some backlash due to its depiction of Auschwitz victims, has penned an op-ed denouncing rising antisemitism in France.

Hazanavicius, who is the Jewish son of Holocaust survivors from Eastern Europe, rhetorically asked in French newspaper Le Monde, “Why do I have the impression that more and more people have an issue with the simple fact of addressing the genocide against Jews?”

“Why do I have the impression that as a member of a minority like any other, which has had its share of tragedies, I’ve become a member of the dominant caste, the figurehead of oppression, imperialism and injustice? As if being Jewish had become something really murky, vaguely suspect, possibly detestable. How could I have become so evil in such a short time?...

Oscar-winning director and screenwriter Michel Hazanavicius has voiced his fears over rising antisemitism in a heart-felt opinion piece in France’s Le Monde newspaper.

The French-born director is descended from Jewish grandparents who fled persecution in Lithuania and Poland in the 1920s, making a new life in France, to then find themselves on the run again during World War Two.

The director – whose black and white silent movie The Artist won five Oscars in 2012 – has said in the past that he was raised in a family that identified as Jewish but was not religious.

In his opinion piece, Hazanavicius said that until recently his Jewishness had been just one aspect of his identity, to which he did not give much thought, but this was now changing.

“Why, for some time, do I, who am Jewish among other things, who has never really given a damn, have the impression of being...

Matt Dillon, Alice Diop and Karla Sofia Gascon will bring their springtime spirit to this month’s Nouvelles Vagues Film Festival, now running from June 18 – 23 in Biarritz. Launched last year with the support of Chanel, the nascent festival invites both established and emerging talents to share an expansive vision of youth, hosting a competition dedicated to young adult stories overseen by a jury all under the age of 35.

“Across all sections, this festival shines the spotlight on younger generations and celebrates young characters on screen,” says programing director Lili Hinstin. “We wanted to look to the future through the prism of the next generation, and to interrogate the questions and contemporary issues important to them.”

To that end, this sophomore edition kicked off with the world premiere of “Night Call,” a Brussels-set thriller, taking place over the course of one heated night, foisting an unsuspecting locksmith into a criminal underworld...

After closing out last month’s Cannes competition, Michel Hazanavicius’ “The Most Precious of Cargoes” opened this year’s Annecy Animation Festival on an auspicious note. With French productions accounting for one half of Annecy’s 12 competition slots, the Alpine showcase doubles a show of force for Gallic filmmakers writ large – a fact made all the more impressive given their sector’s relative youth.

“20 years ago, French animation barely existed,” says “The Most Precious of Cargoes” executive producer Valerie Schermann, who credits “Kirikou and the Sorceress” director Michel Ocelot with forging a new path that many have since followed. “Michel showed that it was possible to produce animated features in France; without him I would never have been able to make my own films.”

But if Schermann built a sterling filmography in those ensuing decades – with credits such as “Zarafa,” “Wolfy, the Incredible Secret” and “The Red Turtle” – the stalwart...

Explore Helen Mirren’s Life and Career Helen Mirren’s Height Compared to the Average English Woman Helen Mirren’s Height and Her Love for High Heels Helen Mirren’s Shoe Size Across Different Regions A Glimpse into Dame Helen Mirren’s Illustrious Career Fascinating Facts about the Accomplished Helen Mirren Captivating Wisdom from Helen Mirren: Timeless Quotes to Inspire and Empower Helen Mirren Exudes Royal Elegance at Trumbo Premiere in Suzannah Dress

British actress Helen Mirren dazzled on the red carpet at the 77th Cannes Film Festival in a royal purple amethyst satin gown with a sweeping train at the screening of “La Plus Precieuse Des Marchandises” (The Most Precious Of Cargoes) on May 24, 2024, in Cannes, France (Credit: Abaca Press / INSTARimages)

Helen Mirren’s Height Compared to the Average English Woman

Helen Mirren is reportedly 5 feet 4 inches tall (162.6 cm). This places her at approximately the average height of an English woman.

Joey King has been acting since she was little, but she has never had the opportunity to walk the Cannes red carpet. This year, she finally made a remarkable debut at the Cannes Film Festival, and she left a lasting impression by choosing outfits that showcased her charms.

She was seen on two occasions over the weekend, showing support for the French animated drama film The Most Precious of Cargoes, directed by Michel Hazanavicius, and the Chinese-Hong Kong crime drama She’s Got No Name, starring Zhang Ziyi and Michelle Yeoh, and helmed by Peter Chan.

Joey King showcases two contrasting looks and hairstyles at the 77th Cannes Film Festival (Credit: Abaca Press / Pa / INSTARimages)

See the striking differences between Joey King’s dazzling yellow look and icy princess appearance on the red carpet.

Radiating Old Hollywood Glamour in a Yellow Miu Miu Column Gown

King’s style has indeed changed over the years.

Ioncinema.com’s Chief Film Critic Nicholas Bell reviewed the entire competition and more. Here is a comprehensive guide to all the feature films across all sections, including logged reviews and forthcoming ones. Though Cannes might be over, we still have unpublished reviews that will be released over the next month.

In Competition:

All We Imagine as Light – [Review]

Anora – [Review]

The Apprentice – [Review]

Beating Hearts – [Review]

Bird – [Review]

Caught by the Tides – [Review]

Emilia Pérez – [Review]

The Girl with the Needle – [Review]

Grand Tour – [Review]

Kinds of Kindness – [Review]

Limonov: The Ballad – [Review]

Marcello Mio – [Review]

Megalopolis – [Review]

The Most Precious of Cargoes – [Review]

Motel Destino – [Review]

Oh, Canada – [Review]

Parthenope – [Review]

The Seed of the Sacred Fig – [Review]

The Shrouds – [Review]

The Substance – [Review]

Three Kilometres to the End of the World – [Review]

Wild Diamond – [Review]

Un Certain Regard:

Armand

Black Dog

The Damned – [Review]

Dog on Trial

Flow

Holy Cow – [Review]

The Kingdom

My Sunshine

Niki

Norah

On Becoming a Guinea Fowl

Santosh

September Says

The Shameless

The Story of Souleymane...

On awards day, there is what they call le reprise des films de la Compétition – essentially each film in the comp receives one extra screening for those who might have missed the film, and while our top three films didn’t move, some scores did become official. Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig edged out Kapadia’s All We Iagine as Light but one point, while Schrader’s Oh, Canada technically edged out Arnold’s Bird and Jia Zhangke’s Caught by the Tides if we take into consideration the decimal point differences. Here is the final grades and last chart.

The top 5:

Mohammad Rasoulof’ 3.6

Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine as Light 3.5

Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez 3.4

Sean Baker’s Anora 3.4

Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada 3.0

Andrea Arnold’s Bird, 3.0

Jia Zhangke’s Caught by the Tides 3.0

Middle of the pack:

Miguel Gomes’ Grand Tour 2.9

Michel...

If an animated film turns up in the Competition at Cannes, chances are it’s not going to be another Bambi — although, if it were made today, the traumatic shooting of Bambi’s mother would certainly tickle the selection committee. No, Cannes prefers its animation to be skewed towards adults, like René Lalou’s surreal sci-fi Fantastic Planet (1973), Robert Taylor’s raunchy sequel The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat (1974) or Ari Folman’s wartime docudrama Waltz with Bashir (2008). And with The Most Precious of Cargoes, actor turned director and now graphic artist Michel Hazanavicius has turned to the most controversial topic it is possible to approach with pen and ink: the Holocaust.

Five long years in the making, Hazanavicius’s adaptation of the 2019 novel by Jean-Claude Grumberg arrives in Cannes two years after the death of its narrator, Jean-Louis Trintignant, and, unfortunately, a year after the debut of Jonathan Glazer...

The Seed Of The Sacred Fig from Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof has swooped to a late victory on Screen’s 2024 Cannes jury grid with an average score of 3.4.

See the final jury grid below.

The Seed Of The Sacred Fig and Michel Hazanavicius’ The Most Precious Of Cargoes were the final two titles to land on the grid, with the latter scoring 1.2, the lowest score this year.

Rasoulof attended last night’s (May 24) Cannes premiere after fleeing his country following an eight-year prison sentence from Iranian authorities. The family drama follows a judge in Tehran’s Revolutionary Court grappling...

Michel Hazanavicius said that when it came to making his Holocaust feature The Most Precious of Cargoes “the question didn’t even arise” when making it animated. “I would never want to make a live film on this.”

The Artist Oscar winner adapted from the Jean-Claude Grumberg novel. The story follows a poor woodcutter and his wife who, once upon a time, lived in a great forest. Cold, hunger, poverty and a war raging all around them meant their lives were very hard. One day, the woodcutter’s wife rescues a baby girl thrown from one of the many trains that constantly pass through the forest.

Some critics have taken umbrage with the Cannes Competition title and its approach to its portrayal of horrifying scenes. The Screen Daily review wrote, “The worst decision comes in a late sequence showing still, stylized black and white images of the faces of the...

Preity Zinta attended the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival. She dazzled in a pink-coloured saree as she arrived for the screening of the film ‘La Plus Precieuse des Marchandises’ (The Most Precious of Cargoes).

Preity looked stunning in a Seema Gujral-designed, embellished saree. Describing her look as “simple yet with a little bit of sparkle,” Preity expressed her excitement about being at the Cannes Film Festival after a long time.

However, another thing that caught people’s attention was her accent when she spoke at the event. People on social media platforms questioned why she was using a “fake accent”.

Preity Zinta made her Cannes debut in 2006 and later returned to the festival as a brand ambassador for a watch brand.

Queen is here ! Slaying the #Cannes2024 red carpet with her sparkle ✨️ #PreityZinta #CannesFilmFestival pic.twitter.com/492qVHYV99

— Preity Zinta Fandom (@PZ_Fandom) May 25, 2024

View this post on...

The Artist Oscar winner Michel Hazanavicius returned to the Cannes Competition this evening with animated fairy tale feature The Most Precious of Cargoes. The warm applause for the film inside the Grand Théâtre Lumière went on for 10 minutes.

Coming in at a tight 81 minutes, it’s the final Competition film to premiere this year.

Hazanavicius applauded during ‘The Most Precious of Cargoes’ ovation #Cannes2024 pic.twitter.com/3TWoUBF6V9

— Deadline Hollywood (@Deadline) May 24, 2024

The voice cast includes the late Jean-Louis Trintignant, Grégory Gadebois, Dominique Blanc and Denis Podalydès.

Hazanavicius wrote the script for The Most Precious of Cargoes, which is based on the novel by Jean-Claude Grumberg. The story centers on a poor woodcutter and his wife who, once upon a time, lived in a great forest. Cold, hunger, poverty and a war raging all around them meant their lives were very hard.

One day, the woodcutter’s wife rescues...

Of all the films premiering at Cannes this year, “The Most Precious of Cargoes” is both an anomaly (the first animated feature to compete for the Palme d’Or since “Persepolis” in 2007) and the most likely to become a classic. Blending the heavy lines of early-20th-century woodcuts with the gentle pastels of watercolor painting, “The Artist” director Michel Hazanavicius finds a poignant way to address not only the horrors of the Holocaust, but the kindness that combated it, crafting an indelible parable destined to be watched and shared by generations to come.

The polar opposite of “The Zone of Interest,” his hand-drawn adaptation of the slender but impactful novel by Jean-Claude Grumberg engages audiences at the gut, rather than in some abstract intellectual way. It focuses on neither the culprits nor the victims, but average folk who tried to remain neutral — as if such a thing were possible — until...

Competing for Cannes’ top prize, The Most Precious of Cargoes deploys animation to tell a semi-contemporary fairy tale about a lost baby girl who is thrown from a train bound for Auschwitz and found in the snow by a childless woodcutter’s wife. It’s the latest feature by French filmmaker Michel Hazanavicius, who’s been a favorite of the Cannes programmers ever since his cinephile- and crowd-pleasing serio-comic pastiche The Artist (2011) broke him onto the international stage, going on to scoop up awards — including a best picture Oscar — and box-office records (for a near-silent film, at least) worldwide.

Sadly, Hazanavicius’ subsequent films haven’t enjoyed the same success. This latest effort, however, might just be his most commercially viable in a while since Holocaust films nearly always travel. Its portability is only enhanced by it being animated, making it easy to dub this for different territories. If nothing else,...

From politics to buzz films, star appearances and deal making, there was – as always – plenty to talk about at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. Screen gathers together the major discussion points of this year’s festival.

Muted politics

In the build-up to Cannes, there was much talk about how this year’s festival was set to be the most politically charged edition of recent years, amid Israel’s war on Gaza, festival workers threatening strike action and rumours of bombshell #MeToo accusations set to rock the French industry. The result was far more muted, with the #MeToo accusations quickly...

Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light joins Sean Baker’s Anora at the top of Screen’s Cannes jury grid while Gilles Lellouche’s Beating Hearts lands bottom of the pack.

Kapadia’s debut fiction scored 3.3 from the critics including six four stars (excellent), equalling that of Anora. The Indian drama, the first from the country to compete at Cannes in over 30 years, received a further four three stars (good) and two two stars (average).

Click on the image above for the most up-to-date version of the grid.

All We Imagine As Light centres on two nurses with...

Michel Hazanavicius, the Oscar-winning director of “The Artist,” makes a first foray into animation with “The Most Precious of Cargoes” which world premieres at the Cannes Film Festival on May 24. Adapted from Jean-Claude Grumberg’s bestselling novel, “The Most Precious of Cargoes” is the first animated feature to vie for a Palme d’Or since Ari Folman’s “Waltz With Bashir” in 2008; and it will be the last movie watched by the competition jury, presided over by Greta Gerwig, before the closing ceremony.

Hazanavicius developed the project for years and wrote the script with Grumberg, as well as created the drawings. Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat created the original score. The drama intertwines the fate of a Jewish family, including newborn twins, deported to Auschwitz, with that of a poor and childless woodcutter couple living deep in a Polish forest. On the train to the death camp, the young father wraps...

Paris production house Agat Films – Ex Nihilo, which has six films in Cannes, is now in various stages of production on six more titles including Robert Guedigian’s drama Stealing Angel, starring Ariane Ascaride and Jean-Paul Darroussin that is in post. Playtime is handling sales.

Agat Films- Ex Nihilo are separate entities operating under the same banner. “We are a house of auteur cinema,” said producer Nicolas Blanc. “We are at the service of auteurs – we like what they think, what they say and how they say it.”

International titles in the works include Thierry Machado’s Inuit -language Yura,...

Animated feature “Flow,” selected for Cannes’ Un Certain Regard, has debuted an exclusive image and it’s purr-fect.

In the dialogue-free film, a flood is coming, quickly devouring everything on its way: including Cat’s home. There is no human in sight, but luckily, he finds refuge on a boat full of other animals. Together, they silently sail through the cat-astrophe.

Directed by Latvia’s Gints Zilbalodis, “Flow” is produced by Sacrebleu Productions, Dream Well Studio and Take Five. Charades handles sales.

“All the films I’ve made before didn’t have any dialogues either. I think it’s my strength: telling stories through images rather than words,” said the man in question, admitting that “Flow” was always supposed to be “visually driven.”

“All the characters are animals and we wanted them to behave like animals, to keep it grounded this way. It’s not a Disney film. I can...

Studiocanal has unveiled the first clip of Michel Hazanavicius’s “The Most Precious of Cargoes,” an allegorical hand-drawn animated feature which is competing at the Cannes Film Festival. The first animated film to vie for a Palme d’Or since Ari Folman’s “Waltz With Bashir” in 2008, “The Most Precious of Cargoes” is adapted from Jean-Claude Grumberg’s bestselling novel of the same name.

Set during World War II against the backdrop of the Holocaust,” the film has been developed by Hazanavicius, the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind “The Artist,” for many years.Hazanavicius penned the script with Grumberg and created the drawings, with Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat providing the score.

The drama intertwines the fate of a Jewish family, including newborn twins, deported to Auschwitz, with that of a poor and childless woodcutter couple living deep in a Polish forest. On the train to the death camp, the young father wraps...

Update 8 Am Pt: Studiocanal has now unveiled Sara Reese Geffroy as SVP of its nascent Studiocanal Stories label and TV series development.

She will run the French major’s new literary adaptations division, which was unveiled earlier today, while also supervising the development of Studiocanal TV series. She has held the VP Development TV series role for the past three years.

Geffroy will start on May 1 and report into new Studiocanal TV boss M-k Kennedy and Ron Halpern, EVP Global Production and Talent Management.

Studiocanal CEO Anna Marsh said Geffroy’s “knowledge of the sales and production roles, as well as her trusted relationships with the production companies which form part of the Studiocanal ecosystem, are major assets to achieve our ambitions in the franchise and adaptations market.”

Previous: Studiocanal is pushing further into TV and film adaptations of literary IP.

The Canal+-owned company has launched Studiocanal Stories, two...

European production and distribution group StudioCanal has launched a new label, StudioCanal Stories, focused on book-to-screen adaptations. The outfit will be the first of its kind in France and follows StudioCanal’s creation of a dedicated literary adaptation division in 2022.

Unveiling the new label Monday, StudioCanal pointed to the success of book adaptations, citing figures from a study last year by France’s Centre National du Livre (Cnl) that found 42 percent of the top 100 most successful films at the U.S. box office were literary adaptations. The figure for France was 44 percent and, according to the study, the production of literary adaptations for French film and TV has jumped nearly 30 percent over the period from 2015 to 2021.

StudioCanal is bringing two of its latest adaptations: Gilles Lellouche’s Beating Hearts, an adaptation of Neville Thompson’s 2000 novel Jackie Loves Johnser Ok?; and Michel Hazanavicius’ The Most Precious of Cargoes to competition...

The full Cannes Film Festival competition jury has been revealed.

Joining president Greta Gerwig to award this year’s Palme d’Or will be “Killers of the Flower Moon” Oscar nominee Lily Gladstone; “The Three Musketeers” star Eva Green; “Lupin” lead Omar Sy; Ebru Ceylan, who co-wrote the 2014 Palme d’Or winner “Winter Sleep”; director Nadine Labaki, whose “Capernaum” won the Cannes jury prize in 2018; director Juan Antonio Bayona, whose latest film “Society of the Snow” was Oscar-nominated for best international feature; Italian actor Pierfrancesco Favino, who will next appear in Pablo Larraìn’s “Maria” alongside Angelina Jolie; and director Kore-eda Hirokazu, director of the 2018 Palme d’Or winner “Shoplifters.”

The competition lineup for the upcoming festival includes “All We Imagine as Light” by Payal Kapadia; Sean Baker’s “Anora”; Donald Trump biopic “The Apprentice” from Ali Abbasi; Andrea Arnold’s “Bird,” starring Barry Keoghan and Franz Rogowski; “Caught by the Tides...

The official website for the upcoming 48th Annecy International Animation Film Festival has revealed 12 films to compete in this year's official selection of feature films. The lineup includes four Japanese film — Ghost Cat Anzu (French-Japanese co-production) directed by Yoko Kuno, Nobuhiro Yamashita, The Colors Within directed by Naoko Yamada, Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window directed by Shinnosuke Yakuwa, and The Imaginary by Yoshiyuki Momose. The 2024 Annecy International Animation Film Festival Official Selection - Feature films Into the Wonderwoods by Vincent Paronnaud, Alexis Ducard / France, Luxembourg Flow by Gints Zilbalodis / Latvia, Belgium, France Ghost Cat Anzu by Yoko Kuno, Nobuhiro Yamashita / Japan, France The Colors Within by Naoko Yamada / Japan The Most Precious of Cargoes by Michel Hazanavicius / Belgium, France Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window by Shinnosuke Yakuwa / Japan Memoir of a Snail by Adam Elliot / Australia Rock Bottom by María Trénor / Spain, Poland Sauvages by Claude Barras / Switzerland,...

The Cannes Film Festival has unveiled fresh news details about its 77th edition (May 14-25), including a Rendez-vous with…Valeria Golino event.

The Italian actress and director, whose 40-year career spans more than 100 acting credits, broke into directing just over a decade ago and has been invited to Cannes Official Selection twice with films Miele (2013) and Euforia (2018).

She has recently completed The Art of Joy. The adaptation of Goliarda Sapienza’s novel L’arte della gioia, was shot as a series but there is also feature-length cut which will release in cinemas in Italy later this year. The cast features Jasmine Trinca, Tecla Insolia and Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi.

The first episode of the series will be previewed, followed by a dialogue between Valeria Golino and the audience.

The festival also announced the first titles selected for its free Cinéma de la Plage screenings: Daniel Burman’s Transmitzvah, Jul’s Silex and the City,...

Annecy International Animation Film Festival has unveiled the programme for its 2024 edition, including the Competition line-up and a programme of previews from the major studios.

The 12-strong Official Competition includes Adam Elliot’s Australian feature Memoir Of A Snail, in which Succession star Sarah Snook voices a lonely hoarder of ornamental snails; and stop-motion Savages!, director Claude Barras’ first feature since his Bafta- and Oscar-nominated My Life As A Courgette.

Scroll down for the full Competition line-up

The festival will open with Michel Hazanavicius’ Competition title The Most Precious Of Cargoes, heading to Annecy from its debut in Cannes Competition.

Organizers of the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, the world’s oldest and most important animation festival, revealed Thursday that all the big U.S. studio animation players will be in attendance this year to preview some of their most exciting upcoming titles.

Annecy has long been a launch point for global and indie animation, but over the past several years, it has become an increasingly important platform for big studios as well. This year, that trend continues and, indeed, ramps up.

Illumination will continue a popular tradition by hosting a special screening of “Despicable Me 4” in Annecy. The three previous “Despicable” films and the “Minions: The Rise of Gru” spinoff all screened at Annecy, several of them making their world premieres there.

Disney will host sneak peeks of its 2024 animated feature releases: Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” and Walt Disney Animation Studios’ “Moana 2.” Paramount Pictures and Hasbro...

The Annecy International Animation Film Festival has unveiled the line-up for its 2024 edition, running from June 9 to 15. (scroll down for full list of titles and events)

Highlights announced on Thursday include Terry Gilliam as guest of honor to receive an Honorary Cristal and give a masterclass. He joins previously announced honorary guest Wes Anderson.

The main Competition and the Contrechamps sections will showcase 23 new animated features.

Features in the main competition include Oscar-winning director Michel Hazanavicius’ first ever animated feature The Most Precious of Cargoes, which will also open the festival.

The drama follows the fate of baby boy who is thrown from an Auschwitz-bound train by his French-Jewish father. The picture will world premiere first in Competition at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

Other Cannes films in Annecy’s main competition include Un Certain Regard selection Flow by Latvian director Gints Zilbalodis and Ghost Cat Anzu by Japan’s Yoko Kuno,...

The Most Precious of Cargoes, the first animated feature from Oscar-winning French director Michel Hazanavicius (The Artist), will open this year’s Annecy International Animation Film Festival.

The feature is a 2D animated adaptation of the best-selling book by French author Jean-Claude Grumberg. Set during World War II, it tells the story of a French Jewish family deported to Auschwitz. On the train to the death camp, in a desperate gesture, the father throws one of his baby twins out into the snow, where he’s discovered by a childless Polish couple living deep in the forest.

Hazanavicius presented the film as a work-in-progress at Annecy two years ago. French actor Jean-Louis Trintignant narrates the film with voice acting from Dominique Blanc, Denis Podalydès, and Grégory Gadebois. Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat (The Shape of Water) composed the score. Animation is from 3.0 Studio – formerly Prima Linea — the group behind the...

Michel Hazanavicius is back on the Croisette - with animated wartime drama The Most Precious of Cargoes Photo: © Ex Nihilo, Les Compagnons du Cinéma, Studio Canal, France 3 Cinéma, Les Films du Fleuve) The Oscar-wining director of The Artist, Michel Hazanavicius returns to the Cannes Film Festival Competition with his new animated feature The Most Precious of Cargoes, adapted from Jean-Claude Grumberg’s best-selling novel of the same name.

It is set during the Second World World War against the backdrop of the Holocaust and will be the first animated feature to compete in the official selection in more than a decade, since Ari Folman’s Waltz With Bashir in 2008.

Described as “a passion project” for Hazanavicius the story intertwines the fate of a Jewish family, including newborn twins, who are arrested in Paris and deported to Auschwitz, with that of a poor and childless woodcutter couple living in the depths of a Polish forest.

Oliver Stone is unveiling his long-awaited documentary “Lula” at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

Stone filmed the documentary about thrice-elected Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva that encompasses the ruler’s incarceration between 2018 and 2019 and his return to power. Stone was in production on the feature in 2021 during which time Lula da Silva contracted Covid while filming in Cuba.

“Lula” is the latest addition to the star-studded Cannes lineup, which also includes new films from Paul Schrader, Francis Ford Coppola, Yorgos Lanthimos, Andrea Arnold, David Cronenberg, Ali Abbasi, Sean Baker, Jia Zhangke, and Paolo Sorrentino.

Stone teased “Lula” to Jacobin earlier this year, saying that the film would be released “hopefully before the end of the year.”

“As you know, I had him in the other films with Hugo Chávez. And of course, he’s gotten a very dramatic story, with his going to jail after his second term. Now...

Films from Oliver Stone, Michel Hazanavicius and Arnaud Desplechin have been added to the Official Selection of the 77th Cannes Film Festival. They join previously announced titles from David Cronenberg, Yorgos Lanthimos, Francis Ford Coppola and Paul Schrader. Greta Gerwig is the president of this year’s jury.

Stone’s film, “Lula” is a documentary about Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and will have its world premiere as part of the Special Screenings section, which also features “Spectators,” from Arnaud Desplechin. His latest stars “Anatomy of a Fall” child actor Milo Machado Graner as well as Mathieu Amalric (“The Diving Bell and the Butterfly”).

Hazanavicius, a Best Director Oscar winner for “The Artist,” joins the Competition lineup with “La Plus Précieuse des Marchandises” (“The Most Precious of Cargoes”), an animated film about a Jewish child during World War II whose father, in a desperate attempt to save his son’s life,...

The Cannes Film Festival has added 13 new titles to the selection for its 77 th edition, including new films by Oliver Stone, Lou Ye and Arnaud Desplechin as Special Screenings.

Three more titles have been added to competition including Michel Hazanavicius’ animated feature The Most Precious of Cargoes.

Big budget French costume-adventure drama The Count of Monte Cristo, starring Pierre Niney as the titular hero will play Out of Competition.

The new additions are:

Un Certain Regard

When The Light Breaks

Rúnar Rúnarsson

Niki

Céline Sallette 1st film

Flow

Gints Zilbalodis

Cannes Premiere

Vivre, Mourir, Renaitre

Gaël Morel

Maria

Jessica Palud

Special Screenings

Spectateurs

Arnaud Desplechin

Nasty

Tudor Giurgiu

Lula

Oliver Stone

An Unfinished Film

Lou Ye

Out Of Competition

Le Comte De Monte-cristo

Alexandre De La Patellière and Matthieu Delaporte

Competition

LA Plus PRÉCIEUSE Des Marchandises

Michel Hazanavicius

Trei Kilometri Pana LA Capatul Lumii

Emanuel Parvu

The Seed Of The...

Cannes Film Festival has completed its 2024 Official Selection with 13 new films, including three new Competition titles.

Michel Hazanavicius’ The Most Precious Of Cargoes, Emanuel Parvu’s Three Kilometres To The End Of The World and Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed Of The Sacred Fig join the Competition line-up, bringing it to 22 films.

There are four additional special screenings, including Oliver Stone’s documentary Lula, about Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Also added are Arnaud Desplechin’s Filmlovers! [pictured], Lou Ye’s An Unfinished Film and Tudor Giurgiu’s Nasty.

Un Certain Regard will open with Runar Runarsson’s When The Light Breaks,...

Are we capping off the Palme d’Or competition at twenty-one? This might be the case as we learned this morning (looks like Variety has red phone direct access to Thierry Frémaux) that the anticipated (we briefly discussed it in our 11th Hour predix) animated title in The Most Precious of Cargoes from Michel Hazanavicius and a complete surprise new title by Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof in The Seed of the Sacred Fig have been added. After three trips to the Un Certain Regard section, Rasoulof is finally included in the Main Comp — hopefully he’ll be able to be present on the Croisette for the premiere and not under house arrest or any of that garbage.…...

Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof is finally making his way back to the Cannes Film Festival following the controversy surrounding his Un Certain Regard 2023 jury appointment.

Rasoulof was invited to serve on the jury last year but was unable to attend due to Iran’s travel embargo on him. The “There Is No Evil” filmmaker was banned from leaving Iran after being arrested in July 2022 for posting statements criticizing government-sanctioned violence against protesters. Rasoulof was later temporarily released in February 2023 due to ongoing health concerns. He was later pardoned and sentenced to one year of penal servitude and a two-year ban from leaving Iran on the charge of “propaganda against the regime.”

Now, Rasoulof is debuting his latest feature “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” in competition at the festival. While the plot remains under wraps, there is no word on whether Rasoulof will attend the festival. Variety first reported the news.

After announcing a whopping number of English-language films in competition, Cannes Film Festival has added some international titles: Michel Hazanavicius’ animated feature “The Most Precious of Cargoes” and Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof’s “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” Variety has learned.

An auteur-driven allegorical feature, “The Most Precious of Cargoes” (first-look still below) is adapted from Jean-Claude Grumberg’s bestselling novel of the same name, set during World War II against the backdrop of the Holocaust. It will be the first animated feature to compete in more than a decade, since Ari Folman’s “Waltz With Bashir” in 2008.

The film is co-produced and represented internationally by Studiocanal, which also has Gilles Lellouche’s “Beating Hearts” in competition. “The Most Precious of Cargoes” is a passion project for Hazanavicius, the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind “The Artist,” who has been developing the project for years. Hazanavicius penned the script with Grumberg and created the drawings,...