While the festival’s official stance may have been to avoid controversy and politics at all cost, or at the cost of the Palestinian people, there were a few cinematic organizations doing right by them on the Croisette. And the presence of a Palestinian Pavilion in the Marché du Film, with their just-announced Film Fund, brought well-deserved attention to their cause.
I was inspired by something Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman said to me when I asked him about this no-politics rule in Cannes this year. “You should write that in your own voice,” Suleiman said seriously, “so few write about it, they turn their eyes just like everybody else.” Suleiman is the Artistic Advisor to the Doha Film Institute, which has been unrelentingly supporting Palestinian voices.
Thankfully, there are also great journalists like my colleague Melanie Goodfellow at Deadline who did write about an important film fund, launched in Cannes by the Palestine Film Institute. The PFI will open calls to apply for the fund in September 2025 and Palestinians living all over the world will be eligible.
As the Deadline piece points out “The fund will offer grants worth between €5,000 ($5.5k) to €15,000 ($16.7k) to short and feature film projects at various stages of development and production.”
And the initiative come with the collaboration and support of the Fund’s founding partners, IDFA Bertha Fund led by Selin Murat, International Media Support’s Rasmus Steen and Rima Mismar of Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (AFAC), and for additional support from IRIS. More cinematic organizations which support Palestinian filmmakers.
This year in Cannes, there was a single lone Palestinian feature Once Upon a Time in Gaza by Tarzan and Arab Nasser. The film screened in Un Certain Regard, where it ended up winning the Best Director Award for the brothers duo. There was also a short film I’m Glad You’re Dead Now by actor turned director Tawfeek Barhom who also stars in it, along with Ashraf Barhom. The film won the top award for shorts.
However, the well-deserved L’oeil d’Or for Best Documentary did not go to the ACID selection Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk by Iranian helmer Sepideh Farsi with the contribution of slain Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona. Instead the jury for the prize in Cannes, chaired by French actress Julie Gayet awarded it to a Balkan story, Imago by Déni Oumar Pitsaev, which screened in Critics’ Week.
Were they being politically correct, or rather, politically restrained by avoiding a film that seemed to deserve a mention of some kind, considering the lead subject and contributor was murdered as a result of having made it? How many more Palestinians are we going to watch being massacred before someone said ‘STOP!” and calls for peace? I’m baffled this madness has now gone on for nearly two years. TWO years!! Where is diplomacy when it’s needed.
And this idea of avoiding politics on the red carpet and in press conferences, was really only a rule applied to the mention of the Palestinian cause, since there were three Ukrainian films programmed as ‘Three films for Ukraine’ and the line up explained them as a “program dedicated to Ukraine will be held on Tuesday May 13 at the Palais des Festivals, in the Salle Bazin and Salle Buñuel [which] will bring together three works retracing the events and key figures of the conflict.” Plus mentioning American President Donald Trump and all his wrongs appeared to be just fine for Competition Jury president Juliette Binoche and American helmer Wes Anderson. And that felt political too.
So really, the gag rule was only to be applied to Palestine. I get what Suleiman was telling me, and this is my way not to keep silent. Will I be penalized for it in Cannes next year? Well, short of taking my credentials away completely…
Thank goodness for Tunisian helmer Erige Sehiri, who wore a watermelon pin on her beautiful green dress for the press meets around her Un Certain Regard film Promised Sky, and the Doha Film Institute delegation who all went, Suleiman in tow of course, to the Palestine Pavilion in the International Village for a sombre remembrance of the Nakba.
On Friday, May 23rd, Francesca P. Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories was also scheduled to attend the Festival de Cannes, at a special press conference which was initially meant to be held inside the Majestic Hotel. The details are below and if I had been in Cannes, you bet I’d have been there!
Turns out that instead of the Majestic, the event was held somewhere else. I heard from those close on the ground that it ended up being in the Palestinian Pavilion as there had been a lot of “aggressive messages” surrounding it, according to the organizers. Farsi then reached out to the managers of the Pavilion, to ensure everyone’s safety and the event was held there, not at the Majestic. See a shot below featuring the late Hassona’s portrait and Rashid Masharawi speaking to the press. Masharawi was the force behind the 2024 doc From Ground Zero.
One last thing I wanted to add. There was a film last year which really broke apart from the usual female Palestinian filmmaker narrative. It was Laila Abbas’s Thank You For Banking with Us! and it world premiered at the BFI London Film Festival. A few days ago, it thankfully garnered the top award in a Critics’ Awards for Arab film in Cannes, as my lovely colleague Michael Rosser at Screen wrote here. As well as Best Director for Abbas. And it deserves so much more.
It will screen shortly in London, as part of the SAFAR film festival for Arab cinema, and I urge everyone who can to watch it. Here is the link to tickets, just in case.