After an innumerable amount of years in development, Abderrahmane Sissako has finally started shooting his first film since 2014’s “Timbuktu”. The Mauritanian-born director’s “The Perfumed Hill” started production this week.
The film is scripted by the director and Kessen Tall. At TIFF it was picked up for a U.S. release by Cohen Media Group and Gaumont in France. DP Aymerick Pilarski will be part of the film, alongside composer Amine Bouhafa, and editor Nadia Ben Rachid.
Expect a 2023 Cannes premiere.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been seeing some big name directors, Cannes regulars, starting to shoot new works, with what I would assume is, for many of them, the intent of premiering at Cannes. Sofia Coppola and Todd Haynes are starting production on their respective new films next week. Today we reported Jeff Nichols is shooting “The Bikeriders.” We can add all of these, plus Sissako, on our UPDATED Cannes 2023 list:
Asteroid City (Wes Anderson)
Killers of the Flower Moon (Martin Scorsese)
WASP22 Woody Allen
Disappointment Blvd. (Ari Aster)
The Zone of Interest (Jonathan Glazer)
May/September (Todd Haynes)
The Holdovers (Alexander Payne)
Stone Mattress (Lynne Ramsay)
Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos)
La Chimera (Alice Rohrwacher)
On Barren Weeds (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
The Bikeriders (Jeff Nichols)
École de l'air (Robin Campillo)
The Empire (Bruno Dumont)
The Perfumed Hill (Abdherrane Sissako)
Anatomy of a Fall (Justine Triet)
The Beast (Bertrand Bonello)
Lo Capitano (Mateo Garrone)
The Old Oak (Ken Loach)
La Favorite (Maiwenn)
Il sol dell'avvenire (Nanni Moretti)
Dead Leaves (Aki Kaurismaki)
La Conversione (Marco Bellocchio)
The Palace (Roman Polanski)
The Way of the Wind (Terrence Malick)
Club Zero (Jessica Hausner)
Priscilla (Sofia Coppola)
Limonov (Kirill Serebrennikov)
Last Summer (Catherine Breillat)
Untitled NYC Drama (Michel Franco)
The Iron Claw (Sean Durkin)
Eureka (Lisandro Alonso)
Strangers (Andrew Haigh)
That’s 35. Am I missing any?
Cannes boss Thierry Fremaux might have a dilemma next year due to Woody Allen and Roman Polanski potentially having new films ready for the Croisette. Fremaux has defended both filmmakers in the past, but not without getting backlash for it. Then you also have Maiwenn’s new film which stars Johnny Depp. A lot to ponder for Cannes’ head chief in the months to come …
UPDATE: David Michod’s “Wizards,” Justin Kurzel’s “Morning,” and Karim Ainouz’ “Firebrand.”
The short version: "Woman Unknown" was a compromise. The jury deadlocked over "Possible Love" and "NAZA," not able to com to terms, fell back on their #3, May el-Toukhy's film.