The Gan Foundation throws its weight behind La Gradiva

by Fabien Lemercier

26/11/2024 - Marine Atlan’s project is just one of the 2024 works selected for support, which also include those by Maïté Sonnet, Martin Jauvat, Hu Wei, and the duo Marie Amachoukeli and Vladimir Mavounia-Kouka

The Gan Foundation throws its weight behind La Gradiva

Director Marine Atlan, selected with her project La Gradiva

The Gan Film Foundation, which has been supporting first and second feature film projects since 1987, has unveiled its list of 2024 works selected for aid.

These include La Gradiva, which will be the first feature film by Marine Atlan who’s mostly known as a director of photography (on The Rapture [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Iris Kaltenbäck
film profile], among other works) but who has already garnered acclaim as a director through her medium-length movie Daniel [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (awarded a Special Mention in the 2019 Berlinale’s Generation Kplus section). Scheduled to begin shooting in Italy in April next year, the film will revolve around a small group of French high schoolers who set off on a school trip to Pompei. In the midst of this ghost town, they fall prey to vertigo. One by one, James, Toni, Suzanne and their Latin teacher Mrs Mercier are overwhelmed by desire, anger and despair, abandoning themselves to their emotions to the point of losing everything… Production is steered by Inès Daïen Dasi on behalf of Les Films du Poisson.

Another project selected for support is Tu feras tomber les rois, a first feature film by Maïté Sonnet (highly acclaimed for her shorts Massacre and Des jeunes filles enterrent leur vie). Produced by Ethan Selcer on behalf of Quartett Production and due to commence filming in the summer, the film will home in on 13-year-old Sybille who is enjoying a free and happy childhood ensconced in vineyards. But when her little brother is hospitalised due to severe poisoning caused by pesticides, Sybille is left to her own devices facing a new fear: death…

The Gan Film Foundation will also be backing Baise-en-ville by Martin Jauvat (read our article – produced by Emmanuel Chaumet for Ecce Films) and 49 jours, which is Hu Wei’s debut feature film (a director notably nominated for the Best Live Action Short Film Oscar in 2015 via Butter Lamp) produced by Sylvie Pialat on behalf of Les Films du Worso, whose screenplay revolves around a Chinese couple who have been divorced for ten years and who find themselves reunited in Paris, organising the funeral of their only child.

Last but not least, the Foundation awarded its Special 2024 Prize to the animated feature film project Happy End by Marie Amachoukeli (well-known for Party Girl [+see also:
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trailer
interview: Marie Amachoukeli, Claire B…
film profile] and Àma Gloria [+see also:
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interview: Marie Amachoukeli
film profile]) and Vladimir Mavounia-Kouka, who also worked together on I Want Pluto to Be a Planet Again (nominated for the Best Animated Short César in 2018). Produced by Emmanuel-Alain Raynal on behalf of Miyu Productions, the pitch for this movie due to be released in 2026 asks what would happen if Death disappeared overnight? And what would this mean for the world and for Bertha King, a former military career woman who is highly suicidal and more than a little aggrieved by this news?