18/05/2023 - CANNES 2023: Playtime kicks off presales on Monsieur Aznavour, mk2 Films on Joachim Trier and Raoul Peck’s upcoming films, and Orange Studio on Maria starring Matt Dillon

Actor Tahar Rahim, who will star in Grand Corps Malade and Medhi Idir's Monsieur Aznavour (© ZiYouXunLu)

Having been active for two days now at the 76th Cannes Film Festival’s Marché du Film, French international sales agents are continuing to make announcements and kicking off presales on an array of promising projects.

Playtime (read our line-up news) has officially kicked off presales on biopic Monsieur Aznavour by Grand Corps Malade and Medhi Idir (Step By Step [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], School Life [+see also:
trailer
interview: Zita Hanrot
film profile]), whose cast is led by Tahar Rahim. Filming is set to begin at the end of the month on this Kallouche Cinema and Mandarin & Compagnie production.

mk2 Films is in especially brilliant form, wielding a host of works only recently added to their already copious line-up (read our article), which had already found itself bolstered by Raoul Peck’s new documentary Ernest Cole. Brand-new announcements notably revolve around Norwegian director Joachim Trier’s upcoming feature (yet to be named), a filmmaker who has been selected twice before for Cannes’ competition, by way of Back Home (Louder than Bombs) [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Joachim Trier
film profile] in 2015 and The Worst Person in the World [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Joachim Trier
film profile] in 2021 (earning its lead the Best Actress award in the process). His next opus, to be produced by Norway’s Mer Film and Eye Eye Pictures in co-production with French firms Agat Films, MK Production and mk2 Films, is presented as a playful family drama, an intimate, moving and often funny film about family, memory and the need to re-write the stories we tell ourselves in order to get by. The filmmaker penned the screenplay in league with his usual partner in crime Eskil Vogt.

Another star movie on which mk2 Films are kicking off presales is The Thing With Feathers by English director Dylan Southern, starring fellow Brit Benedict Cumberbatch in the lead role. This adaptation of English writer Max Porter’s novel Grief is the Thing with Feathers is produced by Lobo Film and Sunny March with the backing of Film4.

Last but not least, Orange Studio are launching presales on Maria by Jessica Palud (rewarded in Venice’s 2019 Orizzonti line-up for her debut feature Back Home [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]), an adaptation of Vanessa Schneider’s novel Tu t’appelais Maria Schneider, which looks back on the actress’s life (with the lead role entrusted to Anamaria Vartolomei whose star is on the rise since Happening [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Anamaria Vartolomei
film profile]) and specifically the shadier side of filming Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris. Set to play Marlon Brando, American actor Matt Dillon has also joined the cast, which further includes Yvan Attal, Marie Gillain, Céleste Brunnquell and Stanislas Merhar. Fin Août Production are steering the movie.

(Translated from French)