Announcement of the Documentary Competition!
Published on 15/10/2024
CINEMANIA is thrilled to unveil the next part of the 2024 Official Selection: the Documentary Competition. For its 30th edition, CINEMANIA 2024 highlights an exploration of the most captivating documentaries from the Francophone world and beyond. For the very first time in its history, this section will be inaugurated with an Opening Film — UNE JEUNESSE FRANÇAISE, directed by Jérémie Battaglia.
SEE THE JURY
OPENING FILM: Une Jeunesse Française
DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Jury Announcement
The Planète+ Award for Best Documentary will be presented by the Jury, composed of professionals from the We Build Change 2024 cohort of the Cannes Festival, including Johanna Nahon, Sherianne Bekhti, Leela Issa, Xinyu Zhou, and Marine Plagne.
Opening Film: Une Jeunesse Française
Québec Premiere - November 11 at 6:30 PM (Cinéma du Musée)
Produced by Extérieur jour, Les Productions du Lagon, and 13prods, the documentary film UNE JEUNESSE FRANÇAISE was notably selected at the Hot Docs Festival in Toronto. This film, an essay on transmission, immerses us in the lives of Jawad and Belka, two young men of Maghrebian descent with a passion for Camargue bull races. More than just a traditional sport, UNE JEUNESSE FRANÇAISE shows how this battle offers many young immigrants the chance to assert themselves and find their place, both in the arena and in French society.
Distributed in Canada by Les Films du 3 Mars, UNE JEUNESSE FRANÇAISE will be released in theaters on November 15. ⬆
Synopsis
Jawad and Belka share the same country of origin, but above all, the same passion: Camargue bull races, a non-lethal confrontation between man and bull. Jérémie Battaglia delivers a striking documentary on racism, integration, and assimilation, using the heart of the Camargue and its traditional bull races as a lever for emancipation. Jawad and Belka speak little, but everything they say is powerful in a film that avoids clichés and stereotypes. It is a portrait of a generation of immigrants' sons—too Arab to be French, but too French to be Arab. A remarkable essay on transmission. ⬆
Discover the films in the documentary competition
AVERROÈS & ROSA PARKS
by Nicolas Philibert
France · 2024 · 2h23 · VOSTA
Snapshots from the daily lives of two psychiatric units in the same hospital in Val-de-Marne, near Paris, focusing on the individual encounters between patients and caregivers. Nicolas Philibert films the caregivers with the same affection that Agnès Varda expressed for shopkeepers in Daguerréotypes and, in this second part of a documentary trilogy on mental health, emphasizes the almost philosophical purity of the individual patient-caregiver interviews. After exploring therapeutic communities in Sur l'Adamant, Philibert now delicately addresses the reverse therapy method, with the signature style that has made him the most popular contemporary documentary filmmaker in theaters. ⬆
Presented by :
D’ABDUL À LEILA
by Leila Albayaty
Belgium, Germany · 2024 · 1h32 · VOF
After suffering amnesia from an accident, Leila, an artist of Iraqi origin, reconstructs her story by delving into her roots. She learns Arabic, interprets the poems of her exiled Iraqi father, and immerses herself in the narratives of the Gulf War. This is the odyssey of a woman who sings her story to reinvent herself. A poetic work, unique in its use of music, with both intimate and geopolitical dimensions. Leila Albayaty (Berlin Telegram) invites the audience to understand Iraq, this 'other world' where she discovered both the love of her family and the violence of a society ravaged by years of dictatorship, wars, and sanctions. ⬆
Presented by :
LA PASSION SELON BÉATRICE
by Fabrice Du Welz
France, Belgium · 2024 · 1h21 · VOST - with Béatrice Dalle
Fabrice Du Welz asks Béatrice Dalle to follow him to Italy, to the filming locations of Pier Paolo Pasolini's movies and in search of those who knew him, offering a fresh interpretation of the filmmaker's work, who was murdered in 1975. Using Pasolini as a pretext, the director primarily creates a unique documentary about the actress and about passion, when it is neither sexual nor romantic. Filming in black and white, which allows cinephiles to visually reconnect with Pasolini's settings, and alternating between meticulously crafted sequences and more spontaneous ones, Du Welz delivers a significant work for Pasolini (and Dalle) admirers, blending more with dreamlike cinema than traditional documentary. ⬆
LA PEUR AU VENTRE
by Léa Clermont-Dion
Québec · 2024 · 1h23 · VOSTFR
By overturning Roe v. Wade, which had legalized abortion in the United States since 1973, the Supreme Court has taken a step backward. This reversal is symptomatic of a disorienting polarization. Disturbed by this situation, director and feminist Léa Clermont-Dion asks: how will this legal precedent impact us here in Canada? She offers an exploration of the rise of anti-abortion groups in Quebec and across the country, while also providing a rare glimpse into the feminist and pro-choice response that is being organized. Following her hard-hitting film Je vous salue salope: la misogynie au temps du numérique (2022), the filmmaker continues her quest for justice and truth. ⬆
Presented by :
LE COEUR QUI BAT
by Vincent Delerm
France · 2024 · 1h08 · VOF
Vincent Delerm films both anonymous individuals and artist friends, discussing with them their definitions of love and passion. A few years after his first documentary, already an exploration of emotions in their most literal sense, Vincent Delerm extends his reflection on love, its thrills, and its many interpretations. His poetic lyricism, familiar from his albums, is present here, with visuals reminiscent of Truffaut’s The Soft Skin, perfectly matching the words (and woes) of the poet. The film also offers a philosophical approach to the universally cinematic question: 'Should one live fast and intensely, or long and at a slower pace ? ⬆
Presented by :
LE GARÇON
by Zabou Breitman et Florent Vassault
France · 2024 · 1h38 · VOF - Cast : Damien Sobieraff, Nicolas Avinée, Isabelle Nanty, François Berléand
Actress-director Zabou Breitman (The Swallows of Kabul, Remember the Beautiful Things) embarks on an unusual journey: imagining the life of a boy discovered in an old photograph found in an album bought at a flea market. These are images and memories of an unknown family, yet one that feels strangely familiar. At the center is the boy, with such a gentle, sad, and joyful gaze all at once. Who is he? What is his real story, the one that reads between the lines? And if every individual was also the unwitting hero of a tale? A dizzying family investigation where reality and fiction intertwine, sometimes blending into one. Co-directed with editor Florent Vassault. ⬆
Presented by :
MADAME HOFMANN
by Sébastien Lifshitz
France · 2023 · 1h44 · VOSTA
The daily life of Madame Hofmann, head of a palliative care unit in Marseille, as she navigates through tumultuous days between hospital and home, balancing the emotional weight of her profession. As usual, Sébastien Lifshitz takes us with immense sensitivity into the world of the extraordinary, in the literal sense of the word. Through the energy of his heroine, whom we follow with tenderness and respect, the filmmaker creates his most beautiful film about life, even though death could be present everywhere. Lifshitz becomes the cinematic spokesperson for those we sometimes applaud but often forget their quiet heroism. ⬆
RIVERBOOM
by Claude Baechtold
Switzerland · 1h35 · 2024 · VOSTFR - Cast : Claude Baechtold, Serge Michel, Paolo Woods
The wild odyssey of three young war reporters in the chaos of Afghanistan, shortly after the 9/11 attacks. Serge, a workaholic journalist, Paolo, a photographer as cheerful as he is reckless, and Claude, a Swiss typographer with a cautious nature. Together, they investigate on the ground to test the promises of American peace. Reluctantly dragged into this adventure, Claude buys a video camera at the Kabul bazaar to film this crazy team that will change his life... only to lose the tapes for twenty years. Now rediscovered, this is a gripping and extraordinary road movie, a tragicomic documentary full of humor. ⬆
Presented by :
RUE DU CONSERVATOIRE
by Valérie Donzelli
France · 2024 · 1h20 · VOF
Clémence, a student at the Conservatory, asks Valérie Donzelli to follow her during the creation of her end-of-year performance, giving the filmmaker—who once missed the entrance exam—the chance to film inside the prestigious school. Donzelli returns to the voice-over style borrowed from the French New Wave that she loves so much to carry the unique narration of her films (Declaration of War, Notre Dame). In this documentary essay, the Conservatory serves merely as a pretext for reflecting on youth, grief, failure, breakups, and creation. A generational film for theater actors known as 'Millennials,' and for the preceding generations who watch them with warmth. ⬆
SPECTATEURS !
by Arnaud Desplechin
France · 2024 · 1h28 · VOF - Cast : Milo Machado-Graner, Mathieu Amalric, Françoise Lebrun
It is in childhood that we find Paul Dédalus, who as a mere spectator, will discover what will change his life: cinema. The passion of a film lover will soon give way to the ambitions of a filmmaker. Desplechin returns to his character, Paul Dédalus, and his favorite actor, Mathieu Amalric, filming him in childhood after exploring two other periods of his life in My Sex Life... or How I Got Into an Argument and My Golden Days. Thus, he concludes his own trilogy by going back to the source. A narrative about the importance of culture in early childhood, which shapes us, and about vocation. ⬆
Presented by :
