20/04/2005

Hidden, the latest film by Michael Haneke, has just been selected for the official competition of the upcoming Cannes Film Festival.

This film, shot in French, was finished this Spring. It is the second time (after his latest work Le temps du loup) that Haneke has chosen French producers. He is indeed, like the writers Thomas Bernhard and Elfriede Jelinek (who, for that matter, inspired him the film The pianist), one of the most committed Austrian artists and one of the first to criticise the political evolution of his country. This led him to settle in France, although the director also points out that his moving is the expression of the fact that he does not want his films to relate to any specific place, apart from the fictional world they define.
Thus, Hidden, which was entirely written by the director, focuses on a wealthy couple, Georges (Daniel Auteuil), the host of a literature programme on television, and Anne (Juliette Binoche), an editor in Paris ; their idyllic life is suddenly disrupted when they start receiving disturbing drawings and anonymous video tapes of their own lives. The mysterious voyeur gradually appears to be particularly interested in Georges’ childhood in Algeria, where the latter seems to have committed some kind of crime. As the past unravels, slowly and painfully, Anne’s terror grows, for she realises her husband has become a stranger in the presence of whom neither her nor her son can be safe.
Hidden, also interpreted by Annie Girardot and Denis Podalydès, was shot in France and Austria. It was produced by the French company Les Films du Losange, with the participation of France 3 Cinéma, Arte France, the CNC, and Canal+. Its foreign coproducers are Wega Film (Austria), Bavaria Film (Germany), and BIM Distribuzione (Italy). Les Films du Losange, also in charge of the international sales, have already sold it to Italy (BIM) and the UK (Artificial Eye). The company will launch it in France on the 11th of October 2005.

(Translated from French)