Screen staff preview each of the titles in the Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard section, which this year includes films from Judith Godreche, Jane Schoenbrun and Sandra Wollner.
The festival runs May 12-23.
All The Lovers In The Night (Japan)
Dir. Yukiko Sode
Director Sode’s adaptation of a 2011 novel by Mieko Kawakami centres on a freelance proofreader living in solitude whose life begins to change on meeting a high-school physics teacher. It stars Yukino Kishii, who won best actress at the Japanese Academy Awards in 2023 for Small, Slow But Steady, and Tadanobu Asano, who won the best supporting actor Golden Globe in 2025 for series Shōgun. Sode is known for Aristocrats, which played at Rotterdam in 2021. Kawakami’s book was the first Japanese novel to be nominated for the American National Book Critics Circle Award.
Contact: Bitters End
Ben’imana (Rwanda)
Dir. Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo
Dusabejambo breaks new ground as the first Rwandan director to have a feature film in Cannes’ official selection. This debut work is set in 2012 and follows a survivor of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi people who is working in community-led justice and reconciliation, only to face a personal crisis that puts her convictions in a new light. The director has explored the genocide in her previous work, including Tribeca-selected short Lyiza in 2011. Ben’imana was first at Cannes in 2022 as part of L’Institut Francais’ La Fabrique Cinéma development programme.
Contact: mk2 Films
Club Kid (US)
Dir. Jordan Firstman
US multi-hyphenate Firstman has earned a following, especially among LGBTQ+ audiences, for his acting work in comedy series such as I Love LA and Sundance feature Rotting In The Sun. He makes his feature directing debut on this New York-set drama about a washed-up party promoter who is forced to turn his life around when an unexpected visitor arrives. He also stars alongside Cara Delevingne. Producers for Topic Studios and Stay Gold Features include Alex Coco, an Oscar winner for Sean Baker’s Anora. UTA Independent Film Group is handling North America and global rights.
Contact: Charades
Congo Boy (CAR-DRC-Fr-It)
Dir. Rafiki Fariala
In the Central African Republic capital of Bangui, 17-year-old Robert’s dream of a music career is in jeopardy: his parents have been thrown in prison, leaving him to care for his four younger siblings, and civil war is tearing apart the country. Congolese director Fariala makes his fiction feature debut after documentary We, Students! launched in Berlinale Panorama in 2022. Congo Boy came through Marrakech Film Festival’s prestigious Atlas workshops in 2022, and features dialogue in the African languages of Sango, Lingala and Swahili, as well as French.
Contact: The Party Film Sales
Elephants In The Fog (Nepal-Ger-Bra-Fr-Nor)
Dir. Abinash Bikram Shah
In a small Nepalese village, the matriarch of a community of Kinnar women dreams of a life with the man she loves. But when one of her daughters disappears, she must choose between love and responsibility to the community. It marks the debut feature of Shah, whose short Lori received a special mention at Cannes in 2022. He also co-wrote Min Bahadur Bham’s 2024 Berlinale title Shambhala. The crew of Elephants has Cannes Competition experience: editor Andrew Bird worked on The Seed Of The Sacred Fig and cinematographer Noé Bach lensed Wild Diamond (both 2024).
Contact: Martin Gondre, Best Friend Forever
Everytime (Austria)
Dir. Sandra Wollner
Wollner follows up her 2020 Berlinale prize winner The Trouble With Being Born with this psychological drama. It stars Birgit Minichmayr (The Blood Countess) and centres on a grieving mother, daughter and teenage boy who travel to Tenerife for a delayed family holiday, where past and present begin to blur. Produced by Austria’s Panama Film with Germany’s The Barricades, Everytime was shot between Berlin, Vienna and Tenerife by BIFA-winning cinematographer Gregory Oke (Aftersun).
Contact: Charades
Forever Your Maternal Animal (Belg-Fr-Mex)
Dir. Valentina Maurel
Costa Rican writer/director Maurel has had two shorts at Cannes and four years ago won the directing award in Locarno’s international competition for I Have Electric Dreams. She follows her debut feature with a drama about the confrontation that ensues when a woman returns to Costa Rica after years in Europe and reunites with her reclusive younger sister, her philandering father and a mother immersed in the erotic poems of her youth. Belgium’s Wrong Men and France’s Geko Films co-produced with Mexico’s Pimienta.
Contact: Heretic
A Girl’s Story (Fr)
Dir. Judith Godreche
French actress Godreche’s feature directing debut is based on Annie Ernaux’s autobiographical novel Mémoire De Fille, about an author who revisits a summer camp where she first experienced sexual violence in 1958. Tess Barthélémy, Valérie Dréville and Maïwene Barthelemy star. The film is produced by Carole Lambert at Windy Production and Marc Missonnier of Moana Films. Godreche is a key figure in France’s #MeToo movement and premiered her short Moi Aussi as the opening film of Un Certain Regard in 2024.
Contact: Paradise City Sales
I’ll Be Gone In June (Ger)
Dir. Katharina Rivilis
Russia-born German filmmaker Rivilis’s debut feature is set in a post-9/11 America, where a 16-year-old German exchange student struggles to settle in a sleepy New Mexico desert town, until she meets a boy whose quiet sadness matches her own. Wim Wenders is among the producers, with young actors Naomi Cosma and David Flores heading up the cast. The project has been through extensive development including at Sofia Meetings and the 2023 Berlinale Co-Production Market. It was also part of the C EU Soon strand of Rome’s MIA market last year.
Contact: Luxbox
Iron Boy (Fr)
Dir. Louis Clichy
This family-friendly title features old-school handdrawn animation from Clichy, who co-directed Astérix animations The Secret Of The Magic Potion and The Mansion Of The Gods, and also worked on Pixar blockbusters WALL-E and Up. Iron Boy is the tale of 10-year-old Christophe, who must wear an orthopaedic brace to prevent him from leaning sideways. The voice cast includes Rod Paradot and Clichy regular Alexandre Astier, star and creator of TV fantasy series Kaamelott. Iron Boy is an Eddy Cinéma production with Belgium’s Beside Productions; KMBO Distribution will release in France.
Contact: Playtime
The Meltdown (Chile-US-Sp-Mex)
Dir. Manuela Martelli
Martelli was in Directors’ Fortnight in 2022 with her debut Chile ’76, which went on to win the BFI London Film Festival’s Sutherland Award. Her follow-up is a mystery set in 1990s Chile, about a girl staying at her grandparents’ remote Andean hotel and the teenage German girls she befriends, only for her new companion to vanish without a trace. Martelli’s Chile ’76 collaborator Alejandra Garcia once again produces for Chile’s Ronda Cine, alongside partners Wood Producciones and US company Cinema Inutile.
Contact: Losange Films
Strawberries (Mor-Fr-Sp-Belg)
Dir. Laïla Marrakchi
Marrakchi’s third feature centres on a group of Moroccan strawberry pickers in Spain, who seek justice against harsh conditions and abuse. The producers are Juliette Schrameck’s French outfit Lumen and Morocco’s Mont Fleuri Production with Spain’s Fasten Films and Belgium’s Mirage Films. Nisrin Erradi, known for Nabil Ayouch’s 2024 Cannes Premiere title Everybody Loves Touda, stars. Strawberries won Marrakech Atlas Workshops’ work-in-progress post-production prize in 2025.
Contact: Lucky Number
Teenage Sex And Death At Camp Miasma (US)
Dir. Jane Schoenbrun
Two years after breaking through with festival favourite I Saw The TV Glow, Schoenbrun returns as writer and director on a trippy horror outing about a queer filmmaker hired to make the latest instalment of a slasher series and the actress who played a key role in the franchise original. Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson star in Un Certain Regard’s opening night film, produced by Plan B, Scythia Films and Mubi, which will also distribute in North America, the UK and other markets.
Contact: The Match Factory
Titanic Ocean (Greece-Ger-Rom-Fr-Sp-Japan)
Dir. Konstantina Kotzamani
This coming-of-age story about teenage girls training to be mermaids at a boarding school in Japan focuses on a 17-year-old girl striving to find her siren voice, experience first love and undergo a metamorphosis. Greek filmmaker Kotzamani’s debut feature has been selected for a slew of international workshops and labs, including TorinoFilmLab, Semaine de la Critique — Next Step II Program, Τiffcom and Venice Gap-Financing Market.
Contact: Paradise City Sales
Ulya (Lat-Est-Pol-Lith)
Dir. Viesturs Kairiss
Latvian actor Karlis Arnolds Avots, a 2025 European Film Promotion Shooting Star, came up with the idea for a film about the true-life rise to fame of Uljana Semjonova, the seven-foot Latvian woman who became an international basketball star and died in January this year. Avots is a male actor playing the female lead, and is a co-writer on the film. It is the ninth feature for Latvia’s Kairiss, whose previous works have often depicted Latvian and Soviet history, and include 2022 Tribeca entry January.
Contact: B-Rated International
Ulysse (Fr)
Dir. Laetitia Masson
Elodie Bouchez and Stanislas Merhar play a couple raising a son with a disability, in what is Masson’s ninth feature. She is best known for 1995 debut To Have (Or Not) and 1998 feature For Sale, which premiered in Un Certain Regard. For Ulysse, she reteams with longtime producers Michele and Laurent Petit of France’s ARP, the prolific French production outfit behind Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague on which Masson was a co-writer.
Contact: Flavien Eripret, Goodfellas
Victorian Psycho (US-UK)
Dir. Zachary Wigon
US filmmaker Wigon’s third feature, after SXSW 2014 premiere The Heart Machine and Toronto 2022 title Sanctuary, unfurls in a Victorian England gothic manor, where a governess is not quite what she seems. Maika Monroe, Jason Isaacs and Thomasin McKenzie star. Producers are Dan Kagan for Traffic, Sébastien Raybaud for Anton and Wigon. Anton is fully financing the horror thriller, which shot in Ireland and the UK. True Brit Entertainment has UK-Ireland rights, while Bleecker Street has US.
Contact: Anton
Words Of Love (Fr)
Dir. Rudi Rosenberg
Hafsia Herzi stars as a woman doing her best to keep the peace in a house filled with a teenage girl, her rambunctious little brother and a cheese-loving dog. When the daughter’s desire to meet her absent father becomes a full-blown obsession, it sets the family on an unpredictable journey. Words Of Love is produced by Hugo Sélignac of Chi-Fou-Mi Productions, with Studiocanal as a co-producer. It is Rosenberg’s second feature after 2015 teen comedy The New Kid.
Contact: Chloe Marquet, Studiocanal
Yesterday The Eye Didn’t Sleep (Belg-Leb-Pal-Qat-Saudi)
Dir. Rakan Mayasi
In the fertile, foggy Bekaa Valley in eastern Lebanon, a truck is set on fire as trouble ripples through a tight-knit community, and two sisters of differing personalities are offered up to resolve a growing conflict. Germany-born Palestinian filmmaker Mayasi is based between Brussels and Beirut and has an extensive shorts career that spans more than 15 years, including SXSW 2023 selection The Key on which, like here, he worked with Salaud Morisset. Mayasi’s debut feature has travelled far in its development, including Sarajevo’s CineLink Industry Days in 2025, and has received backing from Qatar’s Doha Film Institute, Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Fund and the Palestine Film Fund.
Contact: Salaud Morisset
Profiles by: Elisabet Cabeza, Ben Dalton, Charles Gant, John Hazelton, Rebecca Leffler, Jonathan Romney, Michael Rosser, Matt Schley, Anna Stafford, Mona Tabbara, Silvia Wong
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