19/10/2026 - We delve into the 13 projects competing for the 36th Development Grant at the Montpellier Mediterranean Film Festival

Director Karim Bensalah, whose project La Conférence des oiseaux has been selected

The Cinemed Meetings, the three-day industry event organised as part of the 48th Montpellier Mediterranean Film Festival, kick off tomorrow, Tuesday 20 October (see the article and the interview with Christophe Leparc). One of the highlights of the programme is the 36th edition of the Development Grant, with 13 selected fiction feature-film projects set to be presented by their directors and producers to a jury comprising Catherine Bizern (Cinéma du Réel, Moulin d’Andé), Fabienne Moris (Céci Moulin d’Andé), producers Marianne Dumoulin (JBA Production) and Dominique Welinski (DW and head of Next Step Studio), and consultant Thomas Pibarot.

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Two Development Grants will be awarded (funded by the CNC and the Occitanie region, and accompanied by technical support from Cercle Rouge Productions, Saraband, Studio Phare and Titra Film), alongside screenwriting residencies (at Céci Moulin d’Andé and La Fabbrica culturale Casell’arte), and invitations to the Music & Cinema Marseille festival market and the MedMeetings.

In recent years, projects presented at this pitching event have included Before the War by Tommaso Usberti (Grand Prize winner in the most recent Venice International Film Critics’ Week), Aisha Can’t Fly Away by Morad Mostafa (Cannes’ Un Certain Regard), Sleepless City by Guillermo Galoe (Cannes Film Festival Critics’ Week), Little Trouble Girls by Urška Djukić (Berlinale Perspectives), Ghost Trail by Jonathan Millet and Summer 1993 by Carla Simón, to name but a few.

The Cinemed Meetings also encompass the fifth edition of the Cinemed & Aflamuna Industry Meetings (featuring a selection of seven projects in development from the Arab world), the 11th edition of the "Du court au long" initiative (nine debut feature projects presented by filmmakers whose short films are competing in Montpellier this year, to be assessed by a jury, with three screenwriting residencies up for grabs) and the co-production meetings, offering project teams individual appointments with industry professionals attending the event.

Further activities include a Focus on Egyptian Cinema (featuring a round-table and two projects), a showcase project awarded a prize at the Amman Film Industry Days, the 19 projects taking part in the Cinéstoria residencies (Châtaignes Boost Camp and Promeneur-euse-s), the nine projects in the Arab-African Series Lab, pitches by recipients of the Occitanie region's screenwriting grants, and a series of industry meetings and round-tables. These include a discussion dedicated to producer Jérôme Vidal, of Noodles Films, and another addressing disability and acting in film and audiovisual production. The "Talents en court" initiative also forms part of the programme.

Here are the projects selected for the Development Grant:

Songs from the City of the Dead - Abdelwahab Shawky (Egypt/Sudan/Norway)
Production: Amjad Abu Alala (Station Films - Sudan)
Co-production: Fig Leaf Studio (Egypt), Red Star Films (Egypt), Barentsfilm AS (Norway)
After the Sheikh who raised him dies, Younis leaves behind his sheltered life with no work or purpose. Searching for his favourite childhood singer, he journeys through Cairo’s hidden underworlds, where displaced people and outcasts live on society’s margins. Among them, love and friendship lead him through a late coming of age as their world faces destruction.

The Prayer of the Beast (El prec de les feres) – Marta Duran Lozano (Spain)
Production: Montse Pujol-Solà (Boogaloo Films - Spain)
In the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, Mariàngels, a young Francoist widow, is exiled to the mountains to bury a scandal that could ruin her family's name. As she bonds with the village women, she undergoes a mystical transformation that awakens ancient forest legends and threatens a community bound by fear and religious rule.

A Touch of Paradise - Houcem Slouli (Tunisia)
Production: Sarra Ben Hassen (Instinct Blue - Tunisia)
In Gabès, after a toxic gas leak causes Cyrine to lose her unborn child, she fights to expose the truth while her husband, Slim, withdraws into silence, haunted by a secret vision. As pollution contaminates bodies, minds and their relationship, grief turns into an intimate struggle against denial and environmental violence.

Since Summer Ended (Da quando non è più estate) - Giuseppe Isoni (Italy/Spain)
Production: Luca Cabriolu (Ombre Rosse Film Production - Italy)
Co-production: Black Light Films (Spain)
Two inseparable Italian teenage girls and synchronised diving partners are torn apart when one faces a secret forced marriage, just as both stand on the verge of the world championships that could change their lives.

Purgatory - Žiga Virc (Slovenia/Austria)
Production: Iza Strehar (Lilit - Slovenia)
Co-production: Zwinger Film (Austria)
A dying patriarch's final breath echoes like a gunshot. His three estranged children reunite at a remote hunting lodge to bury him and settle the inheritance, but grief is quickly replaced by a ruthless struggle for control. Haunted by fragments of a violent childhood shaped by hunting, dominance and humiliation, the siblings abandon reason as instinct takes over. Human and animal begin to blur, transforming a family reckoning into a brutal fight for survival.

Printemps - Noel Keserwany (Lebanon)
Production: Michelle Keserwany (Barr - Lebanon)
Soha, 25, lives with her parents and sister Rania in a deserted seaside resort in winter. Caught between the seasons and a youth slipping away, she sells counterfeit perfumes in Jounieh. With Rania, she dreams up a risky plan. When a film crew takes shelter in her shop on a rainy day, Soha sees a chance to reclaim her youth, risking leaving her sister behind.

This Land Between Us (Una terra entre nosaltres) – Arnau Vilaró (Spain)
Production: Àngels Masclans (Dos Soles Media - Spain)
Anton returns to his village in the Catalan Pyrenees to transform the horse-training centre belonging to his father, who is ill and reluctant to relinquish control. As the two clash over the estate's future, Anton’s desire for other men throws everything he has inherited from his father and the land where he grew up into crisis.

La Conférence des oiseaux - Karim Bensalah (France/Algeria)
Production: Oualid Baha (Tact Production - France)
Sofiane, 39, struggles in vain to launch a career as a writer, perhaps following in his father’s footsteps. A celebrated Algerian writer living in France, his dad is slipping into irreversible Alzheimer’s, which Sofiane refuses to accept. He takes him to Algeria for a long-awaited talk. The journey will uncover buried truths and help each find their voice.

The Thief and the Saint - Yasser El Ansari (France/Morocco)
Production: Cynthia Pinet (Petites Poupées Production - France)
Co-production: Agora Films (Morocco)
When a petty thief must take his estranged foster brother with Down syndrome across Morocco, an unexpected road trip turns into a journey of redemption and brotherhood.

I Will Drink With the Bees - Léa Triboulet (France)
Production: Jérôme Blesson (La Belle Affaire Productions – France)
Aurora, 15, cannot come to terms with her mother’s sudden death. At the start of the summer, she goes to stay with her aunt in the Pyrenees, in the heart of a small, nearly deserted industrial town, where swarms of bees have mysteriously begun to reappear.

Minus 40 - Waseem Khair (Palestine/France/Italy/Algeria)
Production: Mariam Basha (Nahwand Film - Palestine)
Co-production: La Luna Productions (France), Sayonara Film (Italy), Alpha Tango (Algeria)
The life of a taxi driver from Jerusalem takes an abrupt turn when his world is upended by a tragic accident involving his wife at one of the Israeli military checkpoints in Jerusalem. Determined to confront the brutality of fate and the solitude it brings, he embarks on a journey to create an alternative realm.

Two Loves - Maëva Leïla Youbi (France)
Production: Chantal Fischer (Les Autres Films - France)
In the late 1990s, in the South of France, Esma does everything she can to preserve the carefree innocence of her children, Raphaëlle and Hafsia, while her husband, Ali, who runs a network of illegal slot machines around the Étang de Berre, spirals ever deeper into violence. But the fragile balance she has fought to maintain is on the verge of collapse.

The Criminals - Serhat Karaaslan (France/Turkey)
Production: Ghislain Vidal-Giraud (Orphée Films - France)
Co-production: Liman Films (Turkey)
Nazlı and Emre, young lovers in conservative Anatolia, are violently hunted down for sleeping together in a hotel without a marriage certificate. Cornered, they steal a car and flee. On the road, they pick up Caner, a mysterious fugitive who destabilises their bond. Chased by families, police and Caner's ghosts, they race towards the sea and one fleeting moment of freedom.

(Translated from French)