Cannes Film Festival 2025

Lucie and I have known each other for nearly fifteen years. We studied together and, having become friends, we have always discussed the films we work on. It is in this spirit that we continue our discussions on Nino, Pauline Loquès’ first feature film, presented in competition at Critics’ Week. (EV)

Obviously inspired by Mike Leigh and his exploration of the underdogs of British society, young actor Harris Dickinson chose to follow a young man living on the streets who is fighting to get by in. As his first film as a director, this movie alternates a highly documentary style with frequent telephoto lensing. And ultra-stylised colourfull scenes with much more onirical atmospheres. Director of photography Josée Deshaies, AFC, talks to us about her first shoot in London. Urchin is in the Un Certain Regard selection at Cannes and is also competing for the Camera d’Or... (FR)

Set in a water polo camp, Charlie Polinger’s film draws a portrait of 13-year-old boys in the throes of puberty. The director crafted a somewhat deep soundscape around the pool, and asked cinematographer Steven Breckon to shoot this dark and blue tale about difference on 35mm film. The Plague is in competition in the Un Certain Regard section... (FR)

With La Danse des renards (Wild Foxes), Valéry Carnoy tells the story of friendship between two young boys in a sports training and competition context. This debut film, selected for the Directors’ Fortnight, weaves reality and allegory, as the lives of these young boarders are divided between the training centre and an adjacent forest. Arnaud Guez, a graduate of the INSAS, is lensing this boxing film, in which very few fights are actually shown on screen... (FR)

An apocalyptic road movie set in the desert, Sirât by French-Spanish filmmaker Oliver Laxe (Viendra le feu, Mimosas...) is a film where the landscapes create the plot, bringing to life on screen the journey of Louis (Sergi Lopez) and his young son Esteban in search of his older sister who has recently disappeared. Begining in rave parties background, the film quickly takes the form of a very free-spirited journey reminiscent of Michelangelo Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point from the heyday of hippies and LSD. Spanish director of photography Mauro Herce, AEC, explains the challenges of this journey between sand and rocks, shot in Morocco and Spain, his third feature film with this director. Sirat is in competition for the 2025 Palme d’Or. (FR)

Both a labyrinth movie and a screenwriting laboratory, Vincent Maël Cardona’s Le Roi Soleil (No One Will Know) is a very strange piece of cinema. We enter, sometimes following false leads, only to return and be swept away into a kind of surreal, one room tale that evokes both Luigi Pirandello’s plays and Asian genre cinema. Brice Pancot, AFC, was responsible for filming this story, which required a very rigorous management of the plot’s space and time...

Que ma volonté soit faite (Her Will Be Done), of polish born director Julia Kowalski, was shot in the Vendée region of France with a predominantly Polish cast. The director revisits the themes of exorcism and dark forces that are still very present in Poland, echoing her previous film, J’ai vu le visage du diable (I Saw the Face of the Devil). For her first feature film, Crache cœur (Raging Rose), she was accompanied by director of photography Simon Beaufils. This collaboration continued on her subsequent films, and he returned to shoot her latest feature film, Her Will Be Done, on film with a small crew. The film was selected for the 2025 Cannes Film Festival’s Directors’ Fortnight. (BB)

With Rietland (Reedland), Dutch filmmaker Sven Bresser has made an anti-dramatic debut film deeply rooted in a landscape and a little-known tradition that is gradually disappearing: the culture of reed in the north of the Netherlands. Both an esoteric tale and a social commentary on rural life, the film unfolds in a somewhat timeless rural setting in shades of gold, beige and brown. The 16mm 2.4 format evokes the texture of Carlos Reygadas’ cinema and, with its strong ties to a specific region, that of Bruno Dumont. Sam du Pon, NSC, is lighting and framing this somewhat unique film, in competition at Critics’ Week 2025. (FR)

After Sous les figues (Under the Fig Trees), which was presented at the Directors’ Fortnight in 2022, director Erige Sehiri has once again teamed up with cinematographer Frida Marzouk, AFC, to shoot Promis le ciel, her second feature film. The film is opening the Un Certain Regard section. This story of Ivorian women in Tunis sheds light on the often-overlooked experiences of Black African immigrants in the Maghreb and, above all, offers a multifaceted portrait of three women. (FR)

Laurent Cantet and Robin Campillo met at IDHEC, and Robin was Laurent’s co-writer and editor on most of his films, a lifetime collaboration. Knowing that Laurent’s illness was catching up with him, they decided to co-direct Enzo. The filming, which was originally scheduled for September, was brought forward to June, but Laurent passed away at the end of April. Jeanne Lapoirie was the cinematographer on all of Robin Campillo’s films, including Les Revenants (2004), Eastern Boys (2013), winner of the Orizzonti Award for Best Film at Venice, 120 Battements par minute (120 Beats per Minute, 2017), winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes, and L’Île rouge (2023). Enzo is their fifth collaboration. The film will open the Directors’ Fortnight. (PM)

In an ultra-realistic narrative style reminiscent of the masters of Belgian cinema and their first Palme d’Or in 1999 (Rosetta, starring the late Émilie Dequenne), Laura Wandel takes the viewer into a single environment, in real time at the heart of a hospital’s paediatric ward. Following the head nurse played by Léa Drucker, we gradually become immersed in the plot and the bonds she forms with a distressed mother and her 4-year-old child. Frédéric Noirhomme, SBC, 1.86 metres tall, was responsible for filming this deep dive into the hospital environment of our Belgian neighbours, who seem just as overwhelmed and suffering as our own... L’Intérêt d’Adam (In Adam’s Interest) will therefore open the 2025 Critics’ Week with a special screening. (FR)

The AFC will be present at the 78^th Cannes Film Festival in various capacities. First and foremost, it will be on the screens of the Croisette with nineteen films photographed by its members; three other members will be part of an official jury; and a number of members will accompany a film in selection. It will be hosted by the CST in its pavilion at the Village International Pantiero – its usual meeting place. Finally, it will be present online thanks to articles, interviews with directors of photography whose films are in selection, and photos – alongside news about its associate members – published in its daily newsletter.

78^th Cannes film festival announce its official selection. Its three parallel sections - 64^th Critic’s Week - 57^th Directors’ Fortnight - 33^rd ACID Cannes -did reveal their programs and screening too.