The 75th Cannes Film Festival’s Marché du Film (running 17 – 25 May) looks set to be a busy one for the French international sales agent Totem Films, who will be negotiating on behalf of three titles respectively showcasing in the Official Selection, Critics’ Week and the Directors’ Fortnight.

Headed up by Bérénice Vincent and Laure Parleani, the Totem team will notably be pinning its hopes on Marcel! [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Jasmine Trinca
scheda film], the first feature film directed by Italian actress Jasmine Trinca which is set to be unveiled in an Official Selection Special Screening. The cast stars Alba Rohrwacher, Maayane Conti and Giovanna Ralli, while the story - written by the director together with Francesca Manieri - revolves around three characters: a little girl who’s an insomniac, a mother who’s an artist and a dog called Marcel. The little girl loves her mother with all her heart, but the latter loves Marcel more than anything. Will an unexpected event help these circles of love to intersect? Production comes courtesy of Cinemaundici in league with Totem Atelier (heralding the firm’s first co-production) and RAI Cinema.

Critics’ Week, meanwhile, will see Totem wagering on The Woodcutter Story [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Mykko Myllylahti
scheda film], which is the first feature film to be directed by Finnish screenwriter Mikko Myllylahti (a project which won Critics’ Week’s Next Step Award in 2019 and was selected for the Cannes Film Festival’s Cinéfondation Workshop that same year – read our news), an Aamu Film Company production made in league with Dutch firm Keplerfilm, Denmark’s Beofilm and Germany’s Achtung Panda!.

Another attraction in the Totem line-up is Annie Ernaux and David Ernaux-Briot’s documentary The Super 8 Years [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Annie Ernaux e David Ernau…
scheda film], set to be unveiled in the Directors’ Fortnight, for which the famous French novelist (whose works Happening [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Anamaria Vartolomei
scheda film], Simple Passion [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Danielle Arbid
scheda film] and J’ai aimé vivre là [+leggi anche:
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scheda film] have recently been adapted for the big screen) delved back into her past: "As I watched the super 8 films we’d shot between 1972 and 1981, I realised that they weren’t only part of our family archive, they were also a testimonial to the pastimes, lifestyles and aspirations of a particular social class in the decade following 1968. I wanted to incorporate these silent images into a story where private lives, social issues and history intersect, in order to convey the taste and colour of those years." Production was entrusted to Les Films Pelléas alongside Arte France (La Lucarne).

As for the Marché du Film, this event will see Totem pressing on with pre-sales on five feature films currently in post-production: the French-Moroccan work Animalia [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Sofia Alaoui
scheda film] by Sofia Alaoui, Dead Girls Dancing [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Katarina Stark
scheda film] by Germany’s Anna Roller (a Kalekone Film production whereby a road trip through Italy involving three high school girls takes an unexpected turn), Bowling Saturne [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Patricia Mazuy
scheda film] by French director Patricia Mazuy, Explosions In The Heart by Norway’s Yenni Lee (see our video interview) and A Letter from Helga [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Thorvaldur Kristjánsson
scheda film] by Iceland’s Ása Helga Hjörleifsdóttir (acclaimed in Toronto 2017 for her first feature The Swan [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Ása Helga Hjörleifsdóttir
intervista: Thorvaldur Kristjánsson
scheda film]), who has adapted Bergsveinn Birgisson’s novel of the same name (set in a remote fjord in 1940s Iceland, where young farmer Bjarni and budding poetess Helga embark upon a passionate, forbidden affair, their emotions as wild as the waves of the ocean around them) into a film produced by Vintage Pictures (Iceland) and Zik Zak Filmworks (Iceland), in co-production with Allfilm (Estonia) and Rotterdam Films (the Netherlands).