On Tuesday, May 13, the world-famous Cannes Film Festival will start in France. This year Latvia will be represented in different capacities – both as a co-producer of a film selected for the competition and as an active participant in the film market – in the programme "Producers on the Move" and "Cannes Docs", and in a special event – within the framework of the “Cannes Animation Day”, Latvian producer Matīss Kaža is invited to talk about the film "Flow", which began its world triumph journey exactly a year ago in Cannes.
Published: 09.05.2025.
This year, one of Europe's oldest film festivals in Cannes is taking place for the 78th time, and this time it is special for Latvia in that it gives reason to celebrate the anniversary of the world premiere feature animated film Flow by Gints Zilbalodis in Cannes. Within one year, the film has become a remarkable phenomenon not only in Latvia, but also in Europe and worldwide, thus the film's producer and co-author of the script Matīss Kaža is invited to publicly analyse the success story of Flow – from a small studio and a small country to the most important awards of the world film industry. Traditionally held within the framework of the Cannes Festival and Marché du Film, the “Animation Day” was created this year in collaboration with the National Film Centre of Latvia and is scheduled for May 18; Matīss Kaža keynote speech will begin at 15:30 and will also be available online.
Latvia is participating in the main competition of the Cannes Festival this year as a co-production partner – the official selection, which will be judged by a jury led by French actress Juliette Binoche, includes the film Two Prosecutors, a co-production film from six European countries, the director of which Sergei Loznitsa, has been cooperating with Latvian film professionals since 2012 and is shooting most of his feature films in Latvia. This time, the cooperation partners of the Latvian side are producer Alise Ģelze and studio White Picture, filming also took place in Riga and Aldis Meinerts is included in the credits of the film as one of the main artists.
Two more feature films have been selected in the official selection of the Cannes Festival, which were filmed in Latvia with the co-financing of the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA) and the Riga Film Foundation – The Chronology of Water by Kristen Stewart Un certain regard section, and in the non-competition programme Cannes Premiere – The Dissapearance of Josef Mengele by Kirill Serebrennikov.
The participation of Latvian film professionals in the Cannes film market Marché du Film (May 13-21), which is visited annually by 15,000 world film industry professionals from 140 countries, is particularly extensive and significant this year. Latvian professionals have been selected for participation in important sections of the Cannes film market – in the programme Producers on the Move, Latvia will be represented by producer Kristele Pudane, her studio Sunday Rebel Films produces both feature fiction films, documentaries, and animated series for the smallest audiences. This year, the Cannes Docs programme (May 15 - 2.) once again highlights the common strength of the Baltic region – significant and internationally experienced documentary film producers from three neighbouring countries are included in the Baltic delegation, where Latvia is represented by the head of the studio VFS Films Uldis Cekulis; seven international co-productions are approaching premieres in the studio he leads.
Cannes Film Market, in cooperation with the Tallinn Film Festival, has created an annual programme for the presentation of upcoming film projects PÖFF Goes to Cannes, and this year fiction film Red Code Blue by Oskars Rupenheits has been selected for it, film is scheduled to premiere in Latvia at the beginning of December.
Latvian pavilion is financially supported and organized by the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA), in co-operation with the National Film Centre of Latvia and the Latvian Film Producers Association. Internationally active Latvian film producers, representatives of the National Film Centre of Latvia, as well as the team of the Riga International Film Festival (Riga IFF) and other professionals from Latvia also will be present at Cannes. At a separate stand, Film Studio Rija will work with the distribution of its own films and some other films from Latvia; feature-length animated film Thelma's Perfect Birthday, produced by Rija Films, is scheduled to have several market screenings online.
Magazine Baltic Film, special Cannes issue, for which the content has been prepared in all three countries, highlighting the most current processes and phenomena for the film industries of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, will be available to the festival and market attendees.