06/05/2025 - Brussels-based sales company will be presenting films at the Critics’ Week, the Directors’ Fortnight and ACID

The upcoming Cannes Film Festival Marché du Film (13-21 May) will be particularly active for Best Friend Forever, which is defending five new feature films in various selections.

At the Critics' Week, the team led by Martin Gondre and Charles Bin will unveil Sleepless City, the first feature film by Spanish director Guillermo Galoe, in competition at Cannes and winner of the Goya for his short film Aunque es de noche, and also winner of the Goya for Best Feature Documentary for Delicate Balance [+see also:
trailer
film profile]. The film, a co-production between Spain and France, follows the trajectory of Toni, a young Roma boy of 15, as he makes important choices, torn between his origins and his aspirations: to soar towards an uncertain future, or to cling to the world of his childhood.

Another first feature film at the Critics’ Week is A Useful Ghost, by Thai director Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke, who gained international attention with his short Red Aninsri: or Tiptoeing on the Still Trembling Berlin Wall, winner of the Young Jury Prize at the Locarno Festival in 2020. A Useful Ghost is about grief, family conflicts, ghosts and... hoovers. Critics' Week general delegate Ava Cahen recently described the film to Cineuropa as “a fantastically mad social satire”. The film is a co-production between Thailand, France (Haut les mains), Singapore and Germany (Mayana Films).

During the Directors' Fortnight, Best Friend Forever will present the new film by Quebecer Félix Dufour-Laperrière, La Mort n'existe pas, an atmospheric animated film set in the heart of a forest, in which a young activist is confronted with the consequences of her actions. The film is a co-production between Canada and France (Miyu Productions).

The Brussels-based company is also lining up two French films for selection at ACID. Firstly, the continuation of Sophie Letourneur's “tourist” adventures; after taking Philippe Katerine on Voyages en Italie [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] two years ago, this time she invites him to experience L’Aventura, a story of a family summer holiday told through the eyes of 11-year-old Claudine.

Still in this alternative and pioneering section is Drifting Laurent, by the trio Anton Balekdjian, Léo Couture and Matteo Eustachon, who together “built” Dying in Ibiza (A Film in Three Summers) [+see also:
trailer
film profile], released in 2022. Laurent is 29 years old and looking for meaning in his life. Jobless and homeless, he ends up in a ski resort that is deserted in the off-season, and interferes in the lives of the few locals he meets. When the tourists arrive in winter, Laurent can't leave. Baptiste Peruzat, who plays Laurent, will cross paths with Béatrice Dalle.

In addition to these five premieres, the team will be supporting its rich line-up, which includes Timestamp [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Kateryna Gornostai
film profile] by Ukrainian director Kateryna Gornostai (in competition at the Berlinale); The Things You Kill [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Alireza Khatami
film profile] by Iranian-American director Alireza Khatami, which won the Best Director prize in the World Cinema Dramatic competition at Sundance; Jun Li's Hong Kong film Queerpanorama, discovered at the Berlinale in the Panorama section; and the new film by the unclassifiable Guit brothers, Heads or Fails [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lenny and Harpo Guit
film profile], recently released in France and Belgium to raving reviews.

(Translated from French)