Double Cannes selection for Versus

by Aurore Engelen

20/04/2010 - Liège-based Versus Production will be doubly represented this year at Cannes. Illegal [trailer, film focus] by Olivier Masset-Depasse (Cages [trailer]) is selected in competition in the Directors' Fortnight, while Black Heaven [trailer, film focus] by Gilles Marchand (Who Killed Bambi?) will be presented as a Midnight Screening of the Official Selection.

In Masset-Depasse’s second feature, Anne Coesens plays Tania, a young Russian woman who lives illegally in Belgium with her 13-year-old son Ivan. Constantly on her guard, she dreads police checks until the day she is arrested.

Mother and son are separated and Tania is placed in a detention centre. She will do anything to be reunited with her son but won’t manage to avoid threats of deportation.

Illegal received backing from the Belgian French Community, Wallimage, the Vlaams Audiovisual Fund, RTBF, Tax Shelter and the MEDIA Programme. It is co-produced by France’s Dharamsala and Luxembourg’s Iris Productions. It will be released in Belgium next autumn.

Meanwhile, Marchand’s Black Heaven centres on the experiences of a teenager (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet) who lets himself get sucked into a virtual world by a fascinating young girl (Louise Bourgoin) in search of a partner in death. The cast also includes young Belgian newcomer Pauline Etienne, who plays the protagonist’s girlfriend.

Black Heaven is a majority production by France’s Haut et Court , in co-production with Belgium’s Versus. The film, which was backed by Wallimage, RTBF and the Tax Shelter fund, is due to be released in August.

The two films will be distributed in France by Haut et Court, and in Belgium by O’Brother, the company founded last year by Versus.

(Translated from French)