IFC Films Acquires Hot Cannes Title ‘Corsage’ Starring Vicky Krieps as ‘Sissi’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Vicky Krieps says, a bottle of Evian in her hand, her hair hidden beneath a pink baseball cap and a brown shawl wrapped theatrically around her neck. “It was like being dropped out of an airplane onto a different planet, or surviving a shipwreck. ” The Luxembourg-born actor is describing her life in the aftermath of Phantom Thread, the 2017 Paul Thomas Anderson film that put her toe-to-toe with Daniel Day-Lewis, as the waitress who becomes muse and lover to his society dressmaker.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorThe 39th edition of the Munich Film Festival, which runs June 23-July 2, will screen 120 films from 52 countries, including 35 world premieres, such as “Paloma” by Marcelo Gomes, one of several films in the festival that tackles the subject of trans identities.The three international competition sections will feature numerous highlights from the Cannes Film Festival, including “Corsage,” which opens the event. Vicky Krieps was honored in Cannes with the best actress award in the Un Certain Regard section for her performance as Empress Elisabeth of Austria, also known as “Sissi.” Four films come to Munich fresh from Cannes’ main competition: “Leila’s Brothers” by Iranian director Saeed Roustayi, about a family’s struggle for survival in an Iran economically weakened by Western sanctions and consumed by corruption; “Pacifiction” by Albert Serra, in which Benoît Magimel excels as a conflicted police commissioner; “The Eight Mountains,” directed by Charlotte Vandermeersch and Felix van Groeningen, a touching adaptation of Paolo Cognetti’s novel about a friendship forged in the spectacular natural environment of the Western Alps; and Hirokazu Kore-eda returns with “Broker,” which received the award for best acting performance in Cannes for Song Kang-ho.

EXCLUSIVE: IFC Films has acquired North American rights to sci-fi thriller Vesper (formerly known as Vesper Seeds) directed by Lithuania’s Kristina Buozyte and France’s Bruno Samper.

Chloe Okuno’s feature debut Watcher recorded the biggest opening weekend grosses ever for IFC Films and its IFC Midnight/Shudder label on 764 U.S. screens — also one of the distributor’s widest ever releases.

Sasha Urban editorThe annual Palm Springs International ShortFest returns for its 28th edition from June 21 to 27, holding all of its screenings at the Camelot Theatres at the Palm Springs Cultural Center.The festival will feature 51 programs that showcase 300 films. That list includes 38 world premieres, 17 international premieres, 35 North American premieres and 18 U.S.

Reteaming after last year’s collaboration on Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Oscar-winning Drive My Car, Sideshow and Janus Films have acquired North American rights to veteran auteur Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO, which won the Jury Prize in Cannes this past weekend. A fall theatrical release is planned.

Jury Prize: “Joyland,” directed by Saim SadiqBest Director Prize: Alexandru Belc for “Metronomes”Best Actor Prize (jointly awarded):Vicky Krieps in “Corsage”Adam Bessa in “Harka”Best Screenplay Prize: “Mediterranean Fever,” directed by Maha HajCoup de cœur Prize: “Rodeo,” directed by Lola Quivoron

Guy Lodge Film CriticFrench film “The Worst Ones (Les Pires)” is the surprise winner of the top prize at this year’s Un Certain Regard awards ceremony, with Italian actor-director Valeria Golino and her fellow jurors also handing prizes to Pakistani breakout “Joyland,” Romanian drama “Metronom” and “Corsage” star Vicky Krieps.

JD Linville XYZ Films has acquired writer-director Michelle Garza Cervera’s hotly anticipated breakout feature “Huesera” for theatrical release in North America and has released the first teaser and poster for the film.“Huesera” is one of the first slate of titles under its new distribution arm and an early pick-up ahead of the Tribeca Film Festival, where the film will world premiere.The film follows Valeria, whose joy with becoming pregnant dissolves as she is cursed by a dark power. As danger surrounds her, she’s forced deeper into the occult, and a pact with a coven of witches may be her only hope.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorWhen filmmaker Marie Kreutzer was writing “Corsage,” which chronicles a critical period in the life of Empress Elisabeth of Austria, also known as “Sissi,” she had in mind the experience of other women in the public eye, in particular Princess Diana and Meghan Markle. In recent weeks, she has been mulling the treatment of Amber Heard as well.

Director Emily Atef’s Cannes Un Certain Regard drama More Than Ever is a careful, fastidious, Tradition of Quality film about impending death that’s easy to admire but won’t exactly pack ‘em in.

review, Nicholas Barber wrote that “Corsage” stylistically resembles the dreamy Kristen Stewart film “Spencer.” “Whenever the film seems to be settling into an atmospheric but conventionally good-looking period piece, Kreutzer throws in an amusing and jarring reminder of the modern world, as if Elisabeth were breaking out of her allotted role by time-traveling, momentarily, to the present day,” Barber wrote. “Corsage” follows Elisabeth around her 40th birthday at a time when her role in the empire is slowly becoming more performative and has to fight to maintain her public image by lacing her corset ever tighter and tighter.

For all their faults, the 2020s are shaping up to be a welcome celebration of actor Vicky Krieps. The Luxembourg actress is perhaps best-known with domestic audiences for her performance in Paul Thomas Anderson‘s “Phantom Thread,” but with 2021’s “Bergman Island” and a pair of 2022 Cannes Film Festival titles (“Corsage,” “More Than Ever“) under her belt, she seems poised to enter that rare stratosphere of performers who move between national cinema and Hollywood with ease.

Here are some of the key talking points from the Cannes Film Festival and market at half-way.

Inspired by her own late mother’s long battle with multiple sclerosis, writer/director Emily Atef’s (“Molly’s Way,” “3 Days in Quiberon”) latest work, “More Than Ever,” delivers a poignant and well-acted story. Featuring Gaspard Ulliel’s last performance, the film asks its audience to face the reality of and ponder the inevitability of death as well as the line between those who have experienced a type of suffering and those who haven’t.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorLeading arthouse sales company the Match Factory has acquired the rights to “Bachmann & Frisch,” a biopic about the radical Austrian writer and poet Ingeborg Bachmann, directed by Venice Golden Lion winner Margarethe von Trotta. The film stars Vicky Krieps — who appears in two Cannes Film Festival films this year, “Corsage” and “More Than Ever” — as the poet, and Ronald Zehrfeld (“Barbara,” “Phoenix”) as her partner, the Swiss writer Max Frisch.The pickup follows the international sales success for the Match Factory with Von Trotta’s “Hannah Arendt” in 2012.

A silver spoon clunks loudly inside a bowl of beef broth. The meal — well, barely a meal — is served to Empress Elisabeth of Austria (Vicky Krieps) twice a day, her diet a strict combination of insipid soup and wafer-thin slices of lemon.

IFC Films announced this week that they will reunite with “The Sound of Silence” director Michael Tyburski for his sophomore feature, sci-fi comedy “Turn Me On.” The new movie boasts impressive young talent in leading roles with Bel Powley (“The King of Staten Island,” “White Boy Rick“) and Nick Robinson (“Love, Simon,” “A Teacher“) starring.

Jessica Kiang The Empress is unimpressed. Introduced to us at the beginning of Marie Kreutzer’s sneaky and terrific Un Certain Regard premiere “Corsage,” submerged in a bathtub during one of her many self-imposed endurance training rituals, Duchess Elisabeth Amalie Eugenie in Bavaria, Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary, is holding her breath underwater for as long as she can.