Cannes Film Festival has unveiled their 2024 lineup, including three Element Pictures productions, the latest feature from Irish director Lorcan Finnegan, Irish co-production The Apprentice, and Andrea Arnold’s Bird starring Barry Keoghan.
Cannes Film Festival’s 2024 lineup, announced today, includes several Irish co-productions and productions featuring Irish talent.
The 77th Cannes Film Festival will open with the world premiere of Quentin Dupieux’s surreal comedy Second Act starring Lea Seydoux. This year’s lineup features many highly-anticipated films including Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis, Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, Paul Schrader’s Oh Canada, George Miller’s Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, and many exciting Irish productions. This year’s president of the Competition Jury is Greta Gerwig, director of Barbie, the highest grossing film in Irish box office history.
Three of Element Pictures’ films have been invited to the official selection at Cannes Film Festival. These projects are Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness, Ariane Labed’s September Says, and Rungano Nyoni’s On Becoming a Guinea Fowl.
Kinds of Kindness is Lanthimos’ fifth collaboration with Irish production company Element Pictures, and his fourth with actor Emma Stone. The screenplay was co-written by Lanthimos and Efthimis Filippou (The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer), and developed by Element Pictures and Film4. The film has been selected to premiere in the Main Competition at Cannes, alongside Bird starring Barry Keoghan (The Banshees of Inisherin).
September Says, also an Element Pictures production, is the directorial debut of Ariane Labed. Labed starred in Lanthimos’ first collaboration with Element, The Lobster, and the 2011 Lanthimos-directed film Alps. The feature was filmed in Ireland with backing from Screen Ireland, BBC Film and Mubi among other financiers and will premier ein the Un Certain Regard Section.
On Becoming a Guinea Fowl is the second feature film from Zambian/British director Rungano Nyoni. It will also premiere in the Un Certain Regard section. The film, produced by Element Pictures, was filmed in Zambia and post-produced in Ireland with backing from BBC Film, A24 and Fremantle.
Another Irish production revealed to be premiering at Cannes this year is The Surfer, directed by Lorcan Finnegan (Vivarium) and starring Nicolas Cage (Dream Scenario). The psychological thriller wrapped filming in Yallingup in Western Australia late last year. The Australian/Irish co-production is produced by Finnegan’s Lovely Productions, Tea Shop Productions, Arenamedia, and Gramercy Park Media with support from Screenwest through the Western Australian Production Attraction Incentive. The film will premiere in the Midnight Screenings section of Cannes.
The Apprentice, directed by Ali Abassi (Holy Spider), charts a young Donald Trump’s ascent to power through a Faustian deal with the right-wing lawyer and political fixer Roy Cohn. The film is a Canadian/Irish/Danish co-production. It is produced by Ruth Treacy (Let The Wrong One In) and Julianne Forde (Louise Lives Large) for Irish production company Tailored Films, Daniel Bekerman for Scythia Films (Canada), Jacob Jarek for Profile Pictures, and Abbasi and Louis Tisné for Film Institute.
The 77th Cannes Film Festival will take place from May 14th to 25th, 2024.
