From the Netherlands at Cannes

The world premiere of Sergei Loznitsa’s newest documentary Babi Yar. Context takes place at the Cannes Film Festival. The film screens in the Séance Speciale section of the Festival. The film is produced by ATOMS & VOID (The Netherlands) with the support of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Foundation (Ukraine). Based entirely on archive footage, the film reconstructs the events leading up to the massacre of 33,771 Jews in German occupied Kiev in September 1941, and the aftermath of the tragedy.

Babi Yar. Context is Loznitsa’s 7th film presented in Cannes’ Official Selection. For his last feature film Donbass^* (2018) Loznitsa won the Award for Best Director in the Un Certain Regard competition and A Gentle Creature^** (2017) was part of the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival.

Earlier Cannes already confirmed Paul Verhoeven’s Benedetta^* for Official Selection. The period thriller will world premiere at the Festival on 9 July and will be released in French theatres on the same day. Benedetta is a French-Dutch production, minority co-produced by Amsterdam-based Topkapi Films. The film tells the story of a young nun, Benedetta. She joins an Italian convent and begins a love affair with another woman, while the plague terrorizes the community. The Dutch Job ter Burg, who also worked on Verhoeven’s film Elle (Cannes 2016), joined the director's team once again as the editor of Benedetta. Watch the trailer for Benedetta here.

Submarine minority co-production Where Is Anne Frank?^* by Ari Folman has also been selected for Cannes Official Selection and will play Out of Competition. When Anne Frank’s imaginary friend Kitty emerges from the famous diary, she sets out on a journey through present-day Amsterdam to discover Anne’s fate. Sales are handled by Wild Bunch.

Feathers* by Egyptian filmmaker Omar El Zohairy and minority co-produced by Keplerfilm will world premiere in Cannes Semaine de la Critique. When an abusive Egyptian patriarch turns into a chicken, his family slowly and painfully becomes free.

^*Film is supported by the Netherlands Film Fund.
^**Film is supported by the Netherlands Film Fund, Netherlands Production Incentive.

Source: SEE NL