24/03/2025 - The French-German network will be co-producing the Russian filmmaker’s upcoming movie, alongside works by Mikhaël Hers, Blerta Basholli and Élise Girard

The first 2025 selection committee run by Arte France Cinéma (a group steered by Olivier Père) has decided to commit to co-producing and pre-purchasing four projects.

Standing tall amongst these works is Minotaur, which will be the 6th feature film by Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev (awarded Venice’s Golden Lion in 2003 thanks to Le retour, selected to compete three times in Cannes – with his co-productions The Banishment [+see also:
trailer
film profile] in 2007, his Best Screenplay award-winner Leviathan [+see also:
trailer
film profile] in 2014 and his Jury Prize victor Loveless [+see also:
film review
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interview: Andrey Zvyagintsev
film profile] in 2017 -  and handed a Special Jury Prize in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section in 2011 for Elena). Co-written by Simon Liashenko, his latest opus which is billed as an intimate drama and a political fable falling somewhere between a thriller and a classical tragedy, will revolve around a Russian business head who’s on the point of firing his employees when he discovers his wife is having an affair... Involving MK Productions (France), CG Cinéma (France), Forma Pro Films (Latvia) and Razor Film Produktion (Germany), this production will commence filming in Latvia in September.

Arte France Cinéma will also be throwing its weight behind Une autre histoire, which is the 5th feature film by French director Mikhaël Hers (whose most recent film, The Passengers of the Night [+see also:
film review
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interview: Mikhaël Hers
film profile], was well-received in competition in Berlin in 2022). Written by the filmmaker in league with Maud Ameline, the movie follows the story of forty-year-old Simona who’s grown up abroad. She’s been a teacher in Annecy for some years, where she lives with her husband and daughter. As the summer holidays approach, she receives an unexpected message. The past she believed she’d obliterated floats back up to the surface, calling into question and threatening the balance of her new life... With filming kicking off from the end of August to October 2025, the cast of this Nord-Ouest Films production stars Italy’s Alba Rohrwacher and French actor Bastien Bouillon.

Arte France Cinéma will also be co-producing Dua by Kosovar director Blerta Basholli (the winner of multiple awards in Sundance 2021 thanks to her first feature film, Hive [+see also:
film review
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interview: Blerta Basholli
interview: Yllka Gashi
film profile]), which plunges into the wake of a young teenage girl in Pristina at the end of the ‘90s, in a country on the verge of civil war. Penned by the director alongside Nicole Borgeat, the film will be shot in the autumn, toplined by Luana Bajrami and Arben Bajraktaraj, and involves Kazak Productions (France), Alva Film (Switzerland) and Iköne Studio (Kosovo).

The final project on Arte France Cinéma’s list of chosen films is Le sens de la vie, which will be the 4th feature by French director Élise Girard (Sidonie in Japan [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Élise Girard
film profile]). Starring Luxembourger Vicky Krieps and French actor Alex Lutz, the film will follow in the footsteps of Emma Doucet who is raising her son Oscar on her own and who divides her life between her job, her role providing voluntary writing services, her lover and her son. But the latter is slowly sliding into melancholy and his existential questions are strangely evocative of what his mother is going through… Filming will take place in October and November this year, steered by 10:15! Productions (France), in co-production with Le Plein de Super (France), Lupa Films (Germany) and Mikino (France).

For the record, Arte France Cinéma will also be supporting upcoming movies by Joachim Trier, Tarik Saleh, Nadav Lapid, Kleber Mendonça Filho, Bi Gan, Arnaud Desplechin, Mia Hansen-Løve, Kaouther Ben Hania, Claire Denis, Kornél Mundruczó, Kantemir Balagov, Hafsia Herzi, Yann Gonzalez, Hlynur Pálmason, Justyna Tafel, Diego Céspedes, Momoko Seto, Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet, Laura Samani, Chie Hayakawa, Zou Jing, Chabname Zaria, Marine Atlan, Jérémy Comte, Hu Wei, Louise Hémon, Vincent Le Port, Wesley Rodrigues and by the duo Romain Renard and Fursy Teyssier.

(Translated from French)