Gina Gammell and Riley Keough’s “War Pony” and Charlotte Wells’ “Aftersun” and Agnieszka Smoczyńska’s “The Silent Twins” are among the many highly anticipated female-led feature films slated for their debut in competition at the Deauville American Film Festival.
Eight titles out of the 13 films set to compete in Deauville as the first films. War Pony premiered at Un Certain Regard in Cannes and won the Camera d’Or for Best Debut. War Pony is a collaborative experience that depicts two young Oglala Lakota men torn between tradition and the consumer culture that surrounds them. The Silent Twins, who also bowed to Un Certain Regard, is a biographical film by troubled twin writers June and Jennifer Gibbons starring Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrence.
Meanwhile, Aftersun premiered globally at Cannes Critics’ Week where it won the French Touch and was awarded the A24. The melodrama stars Paul Mescal and newcomer Frankie Curio as a young father and his 11-year-old daughter who vacation at a resort in Turkey in the late 1990s.
Other notable titles competing include Chloe Okuno’s “Watcher,” which bowed out in Sundance and won Best Picture at the Boston Underground Film Festival.
“Since 1995, the year the festival became a competition, our ambition has been to showcase the best of independent American cinema,” said Bruno Bardi, Director of the Deauville Festival.
“The filmmakers of this edition, many of whom have made their debuts, aspire to provide an artistic answer to the questions the world is asking,” continued Bardy, who described the competition as “robust and engaging.”
Bardi said that these films “question our future” and “examine childhood and youth with an unsettling and poignant intensity, making a recurring theme of the transition into adulthood.”
Also among the contenders are “1-800-HOT-NITE” by Nick Ritchie, “Dual” by Riley Stearns, “Emily the Criminal” by John Patton Ford, “Montana Story” by Scott McGehee and David Siegel, and “Over/Under” by Sophia Silver, “Palm Trees and Power Lines” by Jimmy Duck, “Peace in the Valley” by Tyler Riggs, “Scrub” by Vivian Kerr and “Wake Up” by Jimmy Sisley.
The jury of this 48th edition will be chaired by the famous French director Arnaud Desplechin, whose latest film “Brother and Sister” competed in Cannes. The jury includes cinematographer Jean-Paul Severac, actors Lea Drucker, Pierre Deladonchamp and Marine Fact, novelist Yasmina Khadra, director Sophie Letournor, and actor and director Alex Lutz.
Last year’s edition saw “Red Rocket” Sean Baker win a pair of awards. ‘Blue Bayou’, ‘Down with the King’, ‘The Pleasure’ and ‘John and the Hole’ also received awards.
Here’s a teaser for the 2022 edition of the Deauville Film Festival competition lineup:
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