Finalists 2023

In-Person* and Online Screening Schedule:

May 19th, 2023 (Day 1)

  • Drama, Comedy, Music Video, Fashion/Lifestyle and Activism

May 20th, 2023 (Day 2)

  • Documentary, Sci-Fi/Horror, Experimental, Micro Short and Animation

Venue: Eden Hotel and Spa, 133 Rue d'Antibes, 06400 Cannes, France

Time: 10 AM - 3 PM (May 19th and 20th)

*Special Mentions will only screen online (not in-person).

Ready to attend the French Riviera Film Festival?

Tickets are required to access online screening room.

VIP access available for those looking to enhance their festival experience!

FRFF DAY ONE

10 am Official Welcome.

OUT OF COMPETITION SCREENING

Ivalu (Oscar-nominated Live Action Short, 2023)
Director: Anders Walter (Denmark/Greenland)

DRAMA

FINALISTS

Become The Wounded
A couple tries to mend old wounds but realize it’s not about fixing things – it’s about true empathy.
Director: Amir Zargara
Country: Canada

Cinnamon
The story of a newly elected mayor who has been invited to attend a chat show. Whilst in the waiting room, awaiting to go to the interview of the chat show, the young mayor is reminded by the smell of cinnamon where he remembers observing physical and psychological abuse perpetrated by his father to his mother.
Director: Shahid Kamal
Country: United Kingdom

Deer
Ehsan a nine-year-old boy lives with his family in a far village in the North of Iran. His younger brother has a serious illness that cannot be cured by doctors. From an old story he believes that a death angel comes to get his brother’s life in the shape of a deer.
Director: Hadi Babaeifar
Country: Iran

ESTRO
In a timeless, empty and minimalist environment, ESTRO shows the WRITER´s creative process, who falls for the main character of his book: WOMAN, a blues singer.
Director: Daniel Tupinambá
Country: Brazil

People Watching
Two women on the edge of loneliness find each other on a bench at the zoo where the lush imagination of people-watching and their intimate connection awaken the wild of their individual longing.
Director: Kate Campbell
Country: Canada

The Third Defector
What seems like a simple assignment for a spy to keep tabs on an Iranian defector becomes a more complicated game of cat and mouse in the streets of Paris.
Director: John Gray
Country: United States

Till I Return
There is a strange tension in the air. An entire generation of young people is preparing
for departure to an unknown destination, far away from the lives they know, for a very
long time.
Director: Ramy Moharam Fouad
Country: Belgium

Voiceless
An international high school girl is trapped in and experiences a trauma nightmare that she never experienced before.
Director: Cindy Di Xin
Country: United States

Wherefore Art Thou?
An original reimagining of Romeo and Juliet's balcony scene— seen through the eyes of an elderly Juliet and the young nurse who embraces her at the end of her life.
Director: Diana Cossa
Country: United States

SPECIAL MENTION

Absolution
A man sees his psychiatrist for help with a difficult problem. The conversation takes a sinister turn, and all is not what it seems.
Directors: Lauren Spohn
Country: United States

Demanded Supply
A brother-sister assassin duo become part of a scheme much bigger than themselves, when a culture vulturing client calls an audible.
Directors: Sean Famoso, Dennis Williams
Country: United States

how I lost my virginity
Using her best friend's real-life experience of losing her virginity, first-time director Claire Chubbuck explores systematic sexual misperceptions in an award-winning short film - ultimately concluding there is work to do on all sides of the gender perigon.
Directors: Claire Chubbuck
Country: United States

Say Nothing
An undercover voodoo woman is devastated after losing her son to knife violence. Fed up with the youth crime, and tired of the police delay in apprehending the killers, she places a body switch spell on a jaded police officer.
Directors: D’Marie Dowe
Country: United Kingdom

Sob
Valentin and his wife Elena are sick with Covid-19 at its peak when the doors of the hospital are locked. Their last chance is to go to Vladimir Sergeevich, an old, retired doctor with Alzheimer's. Valentine, accepting his fate, asks to be taken home, but Elena, in desperation, decides to take this last opportunity.
Director: Ekaterina Gorbacheva
Country: Russian Federation

COMEDY

FINALISTS

A Bad Shag
After a night of depression and alcohol, a man wakes up in a car. He meets the car’s owner, a benevolent senior who welcomes him into his workshop and offers him a coffee. As the conversation progresses, the tongues loosen...
Director: Jeremy Condamine
Country: France

Hairball
Helen is an older single woman who turns her dates into cats after the tragic untimely deaths of her husband and young adult son.
Director: Nancy O’Brien
Country: United States

Race
An overly confident cop’s first day on the job gets interesting as he navigates unfamiliar territories and people.
Director: Sean Famoso, Dennis Williams, Gladimir Gelin
Country: United States

Take The Chocolate
The story of a two-year-old girl who likes a boy and wants to make him her friend. He is not interested but she wouldn't give up till he is friends with her.
Director: Shahid Kamal
Country: United Kingdom

MUSIC VIDEO

FINALISTS

Far Away Man – The Dalmatians
Director: Wil Allen
Country: Australia

La Tierra Llora – Paulina Aguirre
Directors: Paulina Aguirre, Rick Alanis
Country: Ecuador/United States

Love Louder – The Meeps
Director: Olivier Staphylas
Country: United States

Millionnaire - Phara featuring Norhvn
Director: Wellky
Country: France

FASHION/LIFESTYLE

FINALISTS

Le Conte D'Hiver / Winter's Tale
Whatever she touches or sees takes her to a different time and space.
Director: Cansu Boğuşlu
Country: Turkey

/NOT2B - The Last Fashion Show by Eszter Polyak
Going through six phases, presenting six garments from the designer’s new, now eternal, skeleton in which she is about to enclose herself. And the final answer is: not to be. But is it possible to give this answer? Is it possible not to be?
Director: Giuliano Salvatore
Country: Hungary

Qianlong Visits Jiangnan
Emporer and Empress Quianlong visit their subjects in Jiangnan.
Director: Qihan Li
Country: China

Salt
The story of a group of people, who put away their fear of the elemental forces of nature and instead rediscover natural power, returning a bit to their own roots.
Director: Dominik Hill
Country: Germany

The Window
This film is about a complex crisis of a creative man that may be solved by simple meeting. Unexpected human relationships are able to drastically change the lives of the participants involved.
Director: Giorgi Toradze
Country: Georgia

ACTIVISM

FINALISTS

A Big Heart
The story of a volunteer boy who helped 1000 families of the elderly during the 2020 lockdown.
Director: Eva Lanska
Country: Israel

I Am Light
A cinematic short film that aims to create an emotional connection with viewers and shed light on the experiences of black people in the UK.
Director: Julia Schönstädt
Country: United Kingdom

Chinese Laundry
A short autobiographical dance film about a trans-generational British Chinese immigrant experience of trying to fit in.
Director: Patricia Zhou
Country: United Kingdom

Get Day 1 Ticket

Tickets are required to access online screening room.

VIP access available for those looking to enhance their festival experience!

FRFF DAY TWO

10 am – 11:30 am GLOBAL ENTERTAINMENT SHOWCASE

Panel moderated by Rehna Azim, awards editor Movie Marker Magazine, featuring panelists Diana Madison, Chadwick Pelletier, S.A. Williams, and Viviane Winthrop pls take out S.A. Williams, Should be Chadwick Pelletier, and Viviane Winthrop

Day Two Screenings begin at 12 pm

DOCUMENTARY

FINALISTS

Aureo & Mirele
The short explores self-identity and gender through the eyes of a Brazilian immigrant in Paris as he organizes the arrival of a mysterious lady called Mirele.
Director: Filipe Galvon
Country: United States

Dugout Dick
A heartwarming portrait of an Idaho hermit, Richard “Dugout Dick” Zimmerman, who lived in caves that he dug on the banks of the Salmon River.
Director: Harrod Blank, Joanne Shen
Country: United States

Lorraine
Lorraine Battle speaks on the death of her son, Calvin Antoine Battle. One of the biggest burdens a soul can carry is the loss of a loved one.
Director: Jeremiah Marcus Battle
Country: United States

The Key To Heaven
Ara Davidi Ghazaryan describes his relationship with art and the meaning he gives to the path he has taken in his life and work.
Director: Rossano B. Maniscalchi
Country: United States

Translators
In the United States, there are over 11 million child translators. The story follows Harye, Densel, and Virginia as they translate for their parents in everyday situations.
Director: Rudy Valdez
Country: United States

SCI-FI/HORROR

FINALISTS

Are You Awake?
Dale is a detached woman who earns a living by waking strangers up in the morning. After spending her day making house calls, she agrees to stand-in for a colleague. When she enters a patient's house, she’s unsettled by the mess she finds.
Director: Gabriel Caste
Country: United States

Overview
An astronaut volunteers for a solo flight to scour the galaxy in search of life.
Director: Chandler Gray
Country: United States

Storage
After waking up in a basement storage room with no memory of how she got there or who put her there, a pragmatic doctor must learn to work with an emotionally unstable cheerleader in order to escape.
Director: Colin Francis Costello
Country: United States

EXPERIMENTAL

FINALISTS

Findings
A young woman's process of finding herself. She no longer fits into her own home, but she cannot find a new home, and loses herself in the search for it…
Director: Kristina Schippling
Country: Germany

Totem
The short complements artist Wallace Chan’s eponymous sculpture exhibition, which launched during the opening week of the 59th Venice Biennale.
Director: Javier Ideami
Country: Spain

You Don’t Deserve This
A dead sea separates the almost-was and the art of letting go.
Director: Shaun Rylee
Country: United States

MICRO SHORT

FINALISTS

Only Fire
Only Fire is a visual ode to the birth of a machine conjured from a dream, set to a script that explores the vulnerability of an idea in its infancy.
Director: Neel Kumar
Country: United Arab Emirates

Pandora’s Box
After stealing Pandora's Box, a couple of outlaws must make their great escape à la Bonnie & Clyde as the Mafia and the FBI are close on their tail.
Director: Teo Marinakis
Country: United States

The Enemy
A visual poem based on the quote from Haruki Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle: "Hatred is like a two-edged sword, when you cut the other person, you cut yourself."
Director: Stanislav Smyrnov
Country: Ukraine

13 Days Before Winter
A mother condemned by cancer. A son's suffering. 13 days until the unbearable fate.
Director: Julie Sanchez
Country: France

SPECIAL MENTION

Scrapbooks
While indulging in his favorite hobby, a lonely young man finds himself longing for companionship, especially as two old ladies enter the same patio he’s in and start catching up.
Director: Marie Rouhban
Country: United States

ANIMATION

FINALISTS

Las Posadas (The Inns)
Nine-day Mexican Christmas tradition based on the Nativity story of Mary and Joseph's intrepid trek from Nazareth to Bethlehem in search for a safe place to stay for the birth of baby Jesus.
Director: Patricia Vonne
Country: United States

Somewhere
A story about memory, remembering, and loss, following Vincent, a researcher at the Halo Space Research Center, who makes a detour to Planet Earth to retrieve an item.
Director: Fabrizio Ellul
Country: Malta

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