Lukas Dhont’s Cannes Competition Drama ‘Close’ Sells To Mubi For UK/Ire, LatAm, Turkey & India

EXCLUSIVE: MUBI has acquired David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future for Latin America, Turkey, India and Malaysia.

Made in Chelsea star Maeva D'Ascanio has shown off her growing baby bump in a series of stunning snaps shared on Instagram. The 30 year old looked positively glowing as she was seen in photos of her dressed in a blue form-fitting strapless minidress, highlighting her blossoming figure.

Charlie Amter As the war in Ukraine rages on, recently marking a grim 100-day milestone, some of the country’s music stars are banding together to raise funds abroad in an effort to aid their countrymen, and women, still fighting in the east of the now war-torn nation.Ivan Dorn, one of Ukraine’s most eclectic and best-known music names, just finished a string of European tour dates and he now will be joined by Ukrainian artists The Hardkiss, ONUKA, and Artem Pivovarov in a small American “Stand Up For Ukraine” tour this summer. The trek is set to begin in Miami later this month, with shows to follow next month in Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle.For Dorn, the gigs are a chance to play for Ukrainian fans currently living in the United States, as well as for liberal Russian expatriates and curious Americans who are sympathetic to Ukraine’s current predicament.

Made in Chelsea star James Taylor shared a series of adorable moments with his fiancée Maeva D'Ascanio as he kissed her already-blossoming baby bump during a photo shoot in a garden. The engaged couple, who have been together since 2019, are celebrating the next stage of their lives as they embark on starting a family together. In the stunning snaps, the sweethearts opted for matching white outfits as James opted for a casual suit and chocolate brown loafers.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentParis-based sales company Charades has closed a raft of deals on “Forever Young,” Valeria Bruni Tedeschi’s film which competed at Cannes and earned a warm critical welcome. “Forever Young” opens at the end of the 1980s in Paris and follows a young troupe of comedians who have just have been admitted to Les Amandiers, the prestigious theater school headed by Patrice Chéreau. Bruni Tedeschi wrote the script alongside Agnès De Sacy and regular collaborator Noémie Lvovsky.

Manori Ravindran International EditorCannes competition title “Pacifiction,” from “Liberté” director Albert Serra, has been acquired for the U.S. by specialty distributors Grasshopper Film and Gratitude Films.Serra won the Un Certain Regard section’s Special Jury Prize in 2019 for “Liberté” and cracked the festival’s official selection this year with “Pacifiction.”The film is set on the French Polynesian island of Tahiti, and centers on the High Commissioner of the Republic and French government official, whose role brings him to navigate both the high-end “establishment” and shady venues where he mingles with the locals.

Naman Ramachandran Indian filmmaker Shaunak Sen’s “All That Breathes” has won the Cannes Film Festival’s top documentary award, the Golden Eye.The film won the documentary grand jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year and was acquired by HBO Documentary Films during Cannes, where it played as a special screening.Set in Indian capital Delhi, where, in an unbreathable atmosphere, the threat of inter-religious massacres floats in the air, the film follows two brothers, Nadeem and Saud, who along with their assistant, dedicate their lives to save the migratory black kites that are destroyed by human madness.The Golden Eye jury, composed of Agnieszka Holland, Iryna Tsilyk, Pierre Deladonchamps, Alex Vicente and Hicham Falah, said: “The Golden Eye goes to a film that, in a world of destruction, reminds us that every life matters, and every small action matters. You can grab your camera, you can save a bird, you can hunt for some moments of stealing beauty, it matters.

After taking home the Un Certain Regard Fipresci prize in 2018 for the trans-female ballet dancer feature Girl, filmmaker Lukas Dhont returned to home to find himself staring at the blank page for his next project.

Belgium’s Lukas Dhont takes a deserved step up to the Cannes Film Festival competition with Close, only his second film — a minimalist melodrama that shows a definite growth in visual style but may be confronting to some with its deliberately unhurried, Eric Rohmer-esque aesthetic. The international success of Dhont’s well-intentioned debut Girl, about a young trans-female ballet dancer, was somewhat blunted in the U.S., where G.L.A.A.D. amplified complaints of misrepresentation on behalf of the trans lobby. Close is a much safer proposition, but may yet sail into choppy waters with its themes of youth suicide.

A24 has picked up North American rights to Lukas Dhont’s Close.

A24 has made another acquisition out of Cannes, acquiring the North American rights to “Close,” the next film from Lukas Dhont, which is set to debut tonight in the main competition at Cannes. Dhont is the director of 2018’s “Girl,” which won the Camera d’Or at Cannes, and the film stars Eden Dambrine and Gustav De Waele, and Émilie Dequenne, Léa Drucker, Kevin Janssens, Marc Weiss, Igor Van Dessel, and Léon Bataille.“Close” is described as a film about friendship and responsibility and follows two 13-year-old boys, Léo and Rémi, whose friendship suddenly gets disrupted.

Manori Ravindran International EditorGlobal streamer and distributor MUBI has struck again, this time snapping up select markets for Lukas Dhont’s keenly anticipated “Close.”MUBI has acquired the U.K., Ireland, Latin America, Turkey and India.The film stars Lea Drucker, Émilie Dequenne, Kevin Janssens and newcomers Eden Dambrine and Gustav De Waele. “Close” will receive its world premiere on Thursday at the festival, where it’s playing in competition.The film will be released theatrically followed by an exclusive MUBI streaming release.“Girl,” Dhont’s debut feature film, won the Camera d’Or at Cannes in 2018.

EXCLUSIVE: Utopia has finalized its North American deal for Cannes Competition pic Holy Spider, the noir thriller from Danish-Iranian filmmaker Ali Abbasi. We told you the deal was all but there a couple of days ago.

Gregg Goldstein Belgian director Lukas Dhont is in rare company. His 2018 Un Certain Regard debut, “Girl,” won the Caméra d’Or and three more Cannes prizes, besting the number of first-time feature wins from the likes of Steven Soderbergh and Steve McQueen. And while his rise has come with some controversy, he earned a place in competition with the May 26 Lumière gala premiere of his sophomore effort, “Close.” The story of two 13-year-old boys whose powerful friendship ends when their relationship comes under scrutiny “started from a very personal place,” says the out director, who penned the script with “Girl” co-writer Angelo Tijssens.

The 1969 Competition Lake Placid Blue Mustang that Kurt Cobain used in Nirvana's iconic Smells Like Teen Spirit video has sold for $4. 5 million at auction. Making it the most valuable electric guitar, and second most valuable guitar overall, ever sold at auction after Cobain's 1959 Martin D-18E used during Nirvana's MTV Unplugged performance reached $6 million in 2020.  The Julien's Auctions Music Icons sale at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York had started with a bid of $150,000 and six bids later had hit the $2 million mark.

EXCLUSIVE: Holy Spider, the Ali Abbasi-directed Iranian serial killer thriller, is nearing a deal for U.S. rights with Utopia, the U.S. sales and distribution firm owned by Robert Schwartzman and Cole Harper. The provocative Cannes Competition film premiered today on the Croisette to strong applause.

Lukas Dhont’s Cannes debut was also his debut feature, Girl, which ran in Un Certain Regard in 2018. A stunning start for the young Belgian, the movie brought him the Caméra d’Or and myriad other prizes down the line. Now, four years later, Dhont is returning to Cannes with his follow-up, Close, which has landed him in the main competition.

Made in Chelsea stars Maeva D'Ascanio and James Taylor are engaged, it has been revealed.The couple are set to marry after James, 27, proposed to Maeva, 30, a month ago during a romantic break away in Rome. News of their engagement comes a week after Maeva’s proposal to James was rejected by him in dramatic scenes aired on Made in Chelsea. “This is everything Maeva has ever wanted,” a source close to the pair told Daily Mail.