03/05/2007

The 60th Cannes Film Festival (May 16-27) has got off to an excellent start for Arte France Cinéma, who so far has 10 co-productions selected in the event’s various sections.

Heading the list are three official competition titles: Import/Export [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Austria’s Ulrich Seidl (see news), The Man from London [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] by Hungary’s Bela Tarr (see article) and Carlos Reygadas’ Silent Light [+see also:
trailer
film profile].

Arte titles in the Un Certain Regard sidebar include You, the Living [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Pernilla Sandström
interview: Roy Andersson
film profile] by Sweden’s Roy Andersson (see article), French production The Flight of the Red Balloon [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Hou Hsiao Hsien (see news) and Mister Lonely [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by US director Harmony Korine.

Also in Official Selection is Nicolas Philibert’s documentary Back to Normandie [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which will have a Special Screening, while German helmer Volker Schlöndorff’s Ulzhan [+see also:
trailer
film profile] will feature as one of the tributes to the festival’s 60th anniversary.

Critics’ Week has selected Bruno Merle’s Heroes [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (see news) as opening film and Jellyfish [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] by Israeli filmmakers Etgar Keret and Shira Geffen (see news) in competition.

These are 10 features co-produced and pre-sold by the cinema subsidiary of the French-German culture channel, who last year invested €7.3m in 24 films, primarily in auteur projects (see interview).

At the end of April, Arte’s selection committee announced backing for four new projects, including Bruno Dumont’s Hadewijch, which will begin filming in December 2007 and later in summer 2008 in Paris and in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region. The upcoming film by the director behind last year Cannes prizewinning Flanders [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] will recount the spiritual journey of Céline, a young middle-class girl brought up in a convent who gets involved in petty delinquency and religious terrorism.

Hadewijch, from the slate of 3B Productions, is also inspired by the Flemish poetess and mystic of the same name who lived in the first half of the 13th century.

Three other projects selected at the session were Sylvie Verheyde’s Stella, which begins its shoot at the end of July (Les Films du Veyrier, see news), Ahasinwitai by Sri Lankan director Vimukthi Jayasundara (Les Films Hatari and Unlimited) and Manuel Maoz’s Lebanon (Arsam International).

(Translated from French)