Nicolas Philibert

Documentary filmmaker internationally renowned, Nicolas Philibert directed his first documentary feature in 1978, His Master’s Voice, in which a dozen bosses of leading industrial groups (L’Oréal, IBM, Thomson, Elf…) talk about power, hierarchy, control… gradually sketching out the image of a future world ruled by the financial sector.

From 1985 to 1987, he shot various sports adventure films for TV, then started directing documentary features that would all obtain a theatrical release : Louvre City (1990), In The Land of The Deaf (1992), Animals (1995), Every Little Thing (1996), Who Knows? (1999), Back to Normandy (2006) or Nénette (2009), about a female orang-utan aged 40, in captivity for 37 years in a parisian zoo.

In 2002, his film To Be and To Have, about daily life in a “single class” school in a mountain village, screened as part of the Official Selection at the Cannes Festival, was a huge success in France and forty other countries.

La Maison de la Radio (2013) is a journey into the heart of Radio France to discover what usually escapes our gaze : the mysteries and the wings of a media whose very matter, sound, remains invisible. 

With Each and Every Moment (De chaque instant, 2018), shot in a Nursing Training Institute, Nicolas Philibert pays homage to the nursing profession. And in his new film, On the Adamant (Sur l’Adamant, 2022), he takes us into psychiatry by filming in an atypical Parisian day center installed on the Seine, in a floating structure.

Since 2002, more than one hundred thirty tributes and retrospectives of his films have been set up all over the world.

Maïwenn

Born in 1976 in a Parisian suburb, Maïwenn Le Besco, known by her stage name Maïwenn, began acting at a very young age. Her first major role came at the age of 6 in L’été meurtrier/One Deadly Summer (1983) directed by Jean Becker, alongside Isabelle Adjani. Ten years later, she had a role in Léon (1994) with Natalie Portman. The role that truly established her for a wider audience was her unforgettable appearance as Diva Plavalaguna in Luc Besson’s international hit The Fifth Element (1997). She continued with roles in audience-favorite films like High Tension/Haute Tension (2003) and also in Claude Lelouch’s Les Parisiens (2004) and Le Courage d’aimer (2005).

In 2001, Maïwenn created and performed in a highly personal one-woman show, Le Pois Chiche/The Chickpea. This inspired her directorial debut, Pardonnez-moi/Forgive Me (2006), in which she also played the lead role. This was followed by Le bal des actrices/All About Actresses in 2009, a mockumentary in which Maïwenn portrays herself as a director, conducting a casting that includes Charlotte Rampling, Julie Depardieu, Karin Viard, and many other well-known figures in French cinema. Her film Polisse in 2011 earned her the Jury Prize at Cannes and tremendous success at the box office. In 2015, her film Mon roi/My King, on which she worked for 10 years, competed at Cannes. Her next film, ADN/DNA (2020), in which Fanny Ardant plays the mother of Maïwenn’s character, was scheduled to premiere at Cannes in 2020 but was postponed due to Covid-19 restrictions. Jeanne du Barry opened the Cannes Film Festival in 2023, marking Johnny Depp’s return to the Croisette, with Maïwenn in the lead role.

Lubna Playoust

Lubna Playoust is a French filmmaker and actress. Her debut feature film, Room 999, had its premiere in the official selection in 2023 at Cannes Classics. Additionally, she plays a role in the cast of Canadian director Monia Chokri’s film The Nature of Love (Simple comme Sylvain), which also premiered in 2023 at Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section.

In 2022, her short film Le Cormoran was featured at the Telluride Festival, and in 2021, it garnered recognition at the San Sebastian and Clermont-Ferrand festivals. Currently, Lubna Playoust is in the process of preparing for her next feature film, scheduled to be filmed in Paris in Winter 2023.

Prior to her filmmaking pursuits, Lubna Playoust gained experience working with artists’ collectives and in the fashion industry in Paris. She honed her filmmaking skills through workshops with notable figures such as Abbas Kiarostami, at the Film School in Cuba, and Lucrecia Martel, in Barcelona. Under their guidance, she directed the short films Zulia and Où vont les Canards en hiver?

Furthermore, Lubna Playoust is the founder and curator of the mk2 Curiosity platform, which showcases rare cinematic treasures from around the world on a weekly basis.

Catherine Corsini

Catherine Corsini became widely known to the public due to her 1999 film, La Nouvelle Ève, which was presented at the Berlin Film Festival. La Répétition was selected in the Official Competition at Cannes in 2001. Her seventh film, Partir, achieved remarkable success in cinemas in France and worldwide, also being featured at the Toronto Film Festival. She returned to Cannes in 2013 with Trois Mondes, presented in the Un Certain Regard section, and later at Toronto. La Belle Saison, which won the Variety Piazza Grande Award at Locarno, was nominated in two categories at the 2016 César Awards. With Un Amour Impossible, adapted from Christine Angot’s novel of the same name, Catherine Corsini received the SACD Award, as well as the Henri Langlois and Alice Guy awards. The film was nominated in four categories at the 2019 César Awards. Two years later, La Fracture received six nominations at the César Awards. Catherine Corsini returns to competition at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival with Le Retour.

Mario Martone

Mario Martone began his work in the theater at a very young age. In the 1980s, with his group Falso Movimento (False Movement) he created avant-garde shows contaminated with cinema, which went on long tours worldwide. His first feature film, Morte di un matematico napoletano (Death of a Neapolitan Mathematician), was invited to compete at the Venice Film Festival in 1992, where it won the Grand Jury Prize. Three years later he was in competition at Cannes with L’amore molesto (Nasty Love), based on Elena Ferrante’s first book. He is again in Cannes in 1998 with Teatro di Guerra (Rehearsal for War), and in 2004 with L’odore del sangue (The Scent of Blood), starring Fanny Ardant. It took him six years to realize one of his most ambitious projects, a long film on the Italian conspiracy in the 19th century, Noi credevamo (We Believed), which was presented in 2010 to great public success, followed by an even more considerable success, Il giovane favoloso (Leopardi), on the poet Giacomo Leopardi played by Elio Germano, which will bring more than a million spectators to the cinema in Italy, as well as being much loved in France and other countries. The film about a utopian commune of the early twentieth century, Capri-Revolution, is from 2018. He then made two films intertwined with the world of Neapolitan theatre, Il sindaco del rione Sanità (The Mayor of Rione Sanità) by Eduardo De Filippo (2019), and Qui rido io (The King of Laughter) with Toni Servillo in the title role. Qui rido io (The King of Laughter) is in competition in Venice in 2021, and a few months later Martone is in competition in Cannes with Nostalgia. Over the years Martone, who constantly alternates between theater and cinema, has also made several short films, documentaries and films in other formats. His most recent documentary, on the director and actor Massimo Troisi, Laggiù qualcuno mi ama (Somebody down there likes me) was presented in the last edition of the Berlinale.