28/04/2023 - The French centre will also support Leyla Bouzid, Emma Benestan, Saïd Hamich Benlarbi, Marjane Satrapi, Bruno Podalydès, Jérôme Bonnell and five feature debuts

12 projects have been selected as part of the second 2023 session of the CNC’s advance on receipts committee.

Among them are four second or third features, including Les femmes au balcon which will be Noémie Merlant’s second feature film as director, following Mi Iubita mon amour [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (Special Screening in Cannes’ Official Selection in 2021). Written by the director in collaboration with Céline Sciamma, the film — described as a bloody comedy that mixes genres — will focus on three women in a Marseille apartment during a heatwave. Facing them is their mysterious neighbour, the object of all their fantasies. But the women soon find themselves stuck in a terrifying and wild scenario, with freedom their only goal… The director will also be in the cast, alongside Souheila Yacoub and Sandra Codreanu, and the film should begin filming next summer under the leadership of Pierre Guyard for Nord-Ouest Films.

An advance on receipts will also go to À voix basse by Leyla Bouzid (well received in Venice’s Giornate degli Autori in 2015 with As I Open My Eyes [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Leyla Bouzid
film profile] and in Critics’ Week in Cannes in 2021 with A Tale of Love and Desire [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) which will be produced by Unité; Animale by Emma Benestan (revealed with Fragile [+see also:
trailer
film profile] in 2021), a genre film about violence against women set in the world of bull and horse farms in the Camargue (a June Films production with Belgium’s Frakas); and La mer au loin by Saïd Hamich Benlarbi (the producer’s second feature film directorial effort, after the well-received Return to Bollene [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] in 2018) with Barney Production.

Among the ranks of well-established filmmakers, the CNC will support Paris Paradis by Marjane Satrapi (produced by Vito Films), La petite vadrouille by Bruno Podalydès (Why Not Productions) and Tout recommencera by Jérôme Bonnell (freely inspired by the novel Amours by Leonor de Recondo, and set to be produced by Diaphana Films).

Finally, also worth signalling are five feature debuts that will also benefit from an advance on receipts,s and which are Barbès d’or by Hassan Guerrar (produced by East Films and 24 25 Films, filming this summer), Des preuves d’amour by Alice Douard (produced by Apsara Films), Zion by Nelson Foix (produced by De l’Autre Côté du Périph’ and Kissfilms), Camera Obscura by Yann Rabanier (produced by Gladys Glover Films) and the documentary Imago by Déni Oumar Pitsaev (Tryptique Films).

(Translated from French)