29/05/2015 - The CNC will support the feature debut by Yann Le Quellec in addition to those by Hafsia Herzi, Lidia Terki, Stéphane Breton, and sisters Clara and Laura Laperrousaz

Five feature-debut projects have been accepted during the second 2015 session of the first committee of the CNC’s advance on receipts. Standing out among them is Cornelius, The Howling Miller by Yann Le Quellec, a loose adaptation of the novel of the same name by the famous Finnish author Arto Paasilinna. Produced by Patrick Sobelman and Marc Bordure for Agat Films, the project will see the director, who turned a lot of heads with his shorts Beauty and the Beast (in competition at Locarno in 2012) and Le Quepa sur La Vilni! (unveiled in the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight in 2013 and the winner of the Jean Vigo Award the same year), make the transition to feature films. Le Quellec is also the author of the comic book Love Is in the (Air) Guitar and is the manager of the Cinémage Sofica.

Another advance on receipts has been granted to Bonne mère ! (lit. “Good Mother!”), which will be the directorial feature debut by actress Hafsia Herzi (who rose to fame in The Secret of the Grain [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hafsia Herzi
film profile]). The story revolves around a cleaning lady in her sixties, who is looking after her family on a council estate in the northern suburbs of Marseille, particularly her eldest son, who messed up by getting involved in a hold-up at a petrol station and has been in prison for several months while awaiting his trial. It is worth noting that the project is produced by Abdellatif Kechiche for Quat'Sous Films.

An advance has also been promised to Soleil battant (lit. “Blazing Sun”) by sisters Clara and Laura Laperrousaz, who made a particularly big splash with their medium-length film Retenir les Ciels and who will make the leap to feature films under the guidance of producer Julie Salvador for Christmas in July.

The CNC will also be backing Paris la blanche (lit. “White Paris”) by Lidia Terki, produced by Jean-François Catton for Praxis Films. Having already been supported by the Ile-de-France region, the project (which has a screenplay written by the director together with Colo Tavernier) will recount the misfortunes of a woman who leaves her village in Kabylia for the first time and heads to France in search of her husband, whom she has not heard anything from for several years.

Lastly, another advance will go to the documentary project La moitié du monde [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Stéphane Breton, a movie staged by Patrick Winocour for Quark Productions. 

(Translated from French)