Ioncinema

Since 2011, IONCINEMA.com has kept its finger firmly on the pulse of the Palme d’Or competition. We first dove into the waters back when trades like Screen Daily and Le Film Français still published their jury grids exclusively in print — often a full day after the fact. Today, timely scorecards are everywhere, but we’ve always approached the exercise a little differently here. Delivered twice daily (and sometimes even three times a day), our Cannes Critics’ Panel has remained a steadfast source for readers craving the electric buzz of the Croisette. Four new members join us in Janina, Hosam, Jenny and Eva.… Read the rest

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For a Few Delens More: Balagov Congeals in the Garden State

Kantemir Balagov brings his native Nalchik to New Jersey with his English language debut Butterfly Jam, the title a MacGuffin meant to represent a fantasy world of tall tales and out of reach dreams for a failed father figure grappling with masculine inadequacies. In comparison to his exceptional 2017 debut Closeness and the equally assured follow-up in 2019’s Beanpole (read review), Balagov and co-scribe Maria Stepnova get a bit lost in translation with a questionably cast odyssey of struggling first generation siblings who remain trapped and adrift while operating their nascent family business.… Read the rest

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The Liar of Your Desire: Salvadori Sputters with Low Voltage Rom Com

To some, love might indeed mean never having to say you’re sorry, but the universe (or at least the audience) demands evidence of how complicated formulas lead to the simplest outcomes. Insufficient romantic energy is one of the major issues apparent in the latest lark from Pierre Salvadori, The Electric Kiss (aka La Vénus électrique), a period romcom sent against a carnivalesque backdrop in 1928 Paris. Time and place suggest potential homage to Pagnol or Chaplin, but a strained production design makes this suspension of disbelief iffy, and so we’re left to depend on the strength of a script by Benoit Graffin (who penned Salvadori’s previous rom com con gem Priceless, 2006) and Rebecca Zlotowski (who has a penchant for the supernatural milieu of mediums, evidenced in her underrated Planetarium, 2016).… Read the rest

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Nabbing one of only four non-competition slots in this year’s Critics’ Week selections, French filmmaker Pierre Le Gall will be making his second trip to the Croisette — two years after showcasing his short Les belles cicatrices (2024). Flesh and Fuel (aka Du fioul dans les artères – which translates to Fuel in the Veins) is a queer melodrama set in the world of long-haul truck drivers. His cinema is rooted in themes of movement, masculinity, emotional restraint and working-class solitude, and Le Gall has mentioned that he was fascinated by passing traffic and the idea of the road as both escape and destiny – and here in his feature debut he explores emotionally isolated men searching for connection.… Read the rest

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With her body of work, Franco-Costa Rican filmmaker Valentina Maurel has explored adolescence, female desire, social alienation and fractured family dynamics through a raw, darkly comic lens, and with Forever Your Maternal Animal further digs into the malaise of who and where are the grown-ups in the room. After showcasing a pair of of short films in Cannes with Lucía en el limbo (2019) and Les Chenilles (2023), she returns to the Croisette a short time after launching her feature debut I Have Electric Dreams at 2022’s Locarno Film Festival. In the sequence, Elsa (the older sister) quasi reprimands her sister Amalia for being fiscally irresponsible and in a way represents the emotional debits and withdrawals when she faxes her fractured family.… Read the rest

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Lightning strikes twice today – earlier we premiered the poster one sheet, and now we have the full trailer to Bruno Santamaría Razo’s Six Months in a Pink and Blue Building – an official Critics’ Week competition selection. Filmed on 16mm film, set in 90s Mexico City, the day Bruno turns 11, his growing feelings for his best friend Vladimir clash with the sudden announcement that his father (Lázaro Gabino Rodríguez) has HIV. Like in salsa songs, his family tries to sing and dance their pain away. Thirty years later, Bruno films and reimagines the memory of what he could not quite perceive as a child.… Read the rest

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Lightning strikes twice today – earlier we premiered the poster one sheet, and now we have the full trailer to Bruno Santamaría Razo’s Six Months in a Pink and Blue Building – an official Critics’ Week competition selection. Filmed on 16mm film, set in 90s Mexico City, the day Bruno turns 11, his growing feelings for his best friend Vladimir clash with the sudden announcement that his father (Lázaro Gabino Rodríguez) has HIV. Like in salsa songs, his family tries to sing and dance their pain away. Thirty years later, Bruno films and reimagines the memory of what he could not quite perceive as a child.… Read the rest

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Among the seven films (six debuts) we find in this year’s Critics’ Week competition line-up we find Six Months in a Pink and Blue Building by filmmaker Bruno Santamaría Razo. The Mexico City born director, writer and cinematographer often blends intimate realism with explorations of gender identity, childhood, memory and marginalized communities. His debut came with docus Margarita (2016) and Things We Dare Not Do (2020) — a coming-of-age documentary that focuses on queer identity in a remote coastal village. His fiction debut is semi-autobiographical works with themes of memory and childhood revisited. Produced by Ojo de Vaca Productora’s Bruna Haddad and Carlos Quiñónez (along with Razo), this was co-produced by Desvia Films’ Rachel Daisy Ellis, Camille Reis, Snowglobe’s Giulia Triolo and Katrin Pors), Seis meses en el edificio rosa con azul world premieres next Tuesday on May 19th — Luxbox are handling sales.… Read the rest

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With her sophomore feature High End (formerly known by the far alluring title Diamond Shitter) currently in post-production, Antonia Campbell-Hughes is already preparing to climb back into the saddle with a third feature project—one she already knows intimately. Based on her 2018 short film Q4L, the trades report that Rooney Mara will topline Quest for Love in what should be a rather dark take on limitations of motherhood. Wild Atlantic Pictures’ Macdara Kelleher and John Keville will produce, Les Films Fauves’ Gilles Chanial is tapped as the co-delegate producer. We await further casting and a production start date which could take place as early as 2026.… Read the rest

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Edgar Ramirez, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Annabelle Wallis, Lena Headey, Angeliki Papoulia, Makis Papadimitriou, Spyros Dadanides are among the players who’ll be found in the satirical comedy set on the posh Greek Island of Antiparos — the latest project by Suntan (2016) and Monday (2020) filmmaker Argyris Papadimitropoulos. Variety reports that Oh, How Fun! is setting up production for a shoot later this year on a project that sounds awfully close to Ruben Östlund biting social class portraits. The production team includes Blonde Audiovisual Productions’ Fenia Cossovitsa, Filmiki Productions’ Nicholas Alavanos and Dimitris Logiadis, La Boîte à Fanny’s Fanny-L Malo and Subculture’s Stephen Spence.… Read the rest

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