For this 78th edition, the Cannes Film Festival features cinema embedded in major societal concerns. Feminism, wandering youth, state violence, or a quest for identity. The films in competition this year seem to speak of one and the same thing: our era, in all its intensity.
After looking at the selection of films and their synopses, a theme emerges. Notably with Sound of Falling, by Mascha Schilinski. The film explores the contradictions of female identity. Four girls from four different decades grow up together on a farm and seem to be linked to each other, on one hand through their femininities and also by gender-related issues, reflecting the society of the decade they represent. Meanwhile, Hafsia Herzi adapts La Petite Dernière, an autofiction novel by Fatima Daas, to create a poignant portrait of a young Muslim woman facing her own homosexuality and a burdensome religious framework. Both explore femininity and its complexity to understand who they are and who they want to become.
Youth in Search of Meaning
Youth is one of the significant figures of contemporary cinema. Through two films very different in tone and approach, both depict the doubts, fractures, and hopes of a generation searching for guidance.
Partir un jour, directed by Amélie Bonnin, opens out of competition with a comedy where returning to the hometown becomes a pretext for introspection. The main character, in their thirties, returns for a wedding and faces both the disconnect with others and the feeling of a fixed future. The film highlights a generational issue. That of seemingly adult individuals struggling to find their place in a changing society.
In a similar tone, Jeunes Mères by the Dardenne brothers aligns with social cinema. The film follows five teenage girls from underprivileged backgrounds placed in a specialized shelter for young mothers. It portrays parenting classes, psychological tension, and internal conflicts.
These two works convey urgency. The urgency to tell the story of a youth not aligning with dominant narratives, who doubt, gropingly search, but continue to seek answers. A youth far from clichés of rebellion or carelessness, but with an awakened mind to find answers to their questions.
Social Anger and State Violence
Another theme of this selection is social movements and state violence. Dossier 137, directed by Dominik Moll, revisits a chilling news story inspired by the Yellow Vests movement—a young man grievously injured by a police rubber bullet. But Dossier 137 delves deep into institutional mechanics. The film provides a precise and chilling depiction of the grey areas in justice relating to police violence, bureaucratic negligence, and the pressure on victims’ families. At the same time, it explores the daily life of investigators, involved gendarmes, journalists, without falling into caricature.
A Cinematic Legacy Still Alive
Director Richard Linklater pays tribute to one of the founding myths of modern cinema: the filming of À bout de souffle, Jean-Luc Godard’s iconic work. It is a gesture by a cinephile filmmaker towards French cinema, from an American filmmaker.
The film is neither defined as a biopic nor simply a nostalgic homage. The New Wave, a cult title that defines an entire innovative era of French cinema. The film promises to be a love letter to French cinema.
These works are to be discovered during the fortnight of the Cannes Film Festival.
