Irish cinema will have a notable presence at this year's Cannes Film Festival, with Dublin-based Element Pictures returning to the Official Selection with two titles - Pillion and My Father’s Shadow - while Galway-shot Learning to Breathe Under Water will feature in the Great 8 showcase for emerging talent.
Taking place from 13 to 24 May, Cannes remains the most prestigious film festival in the global calendar, with a highly selective programme. The inclusion of several Irish-backed productions highlights continued international interest in work coming from Ireland.
Element Pictures’ Pillion, starring Alexander Skarsgård and based on the novel by Adam Mars-Jones, is described as the story of a timid man who is swept into a new world when he falls under the spell of a charismatic biker. The film is financed by BBC Film and the BFI.
Also in the Official Selection is My Father’s Shadow, directed by Akinola Davies Jr. Set during the 1993 Nigerian election crisis, it follows a father and his estranged sons navigating Lagos during a period of political unrest. The film is a co-production with Crybaby and Fatherland Productions.
The Paul Mescal and Josh O'Connor-starring The History of Sound will be competing for the festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or. Director Oliver Hermanus, who helmed the Oscar-nominated existential drama Living and tackled apartheid-era brutality in the South African army in his film Moffie, here tells the story of two young men in World War I who decide to record the lives, voices, and music of their American compatriots. The History of Sound is a US/UK co-production that includes Mescal among its executive producers.
In addition, Learning to Breathe Under Water has been selected for the Great 8 showcase - an industry programme that presents emerging UK and Irish films to international buyers and festival programmers. Directed by Rebekah Fortune, the Galway-made feature stars Rory Kinnear, Academy Award nominee Maria Bakalova, and newcomer Ezra Carlisle. The story centres on an imaginative eight-year-old boy who builds a world of his own to make sense of his grief and the mysteries of adult life.
Element Pictures has a long-standing relationship with the Cannes Film Festival, having premiered titles such as The Wind That Shakes the Barley, which won the Palme d’Or in 2006, and more recently Kinds of Kindness, which earned Jesse Plemons the Best Actor award in 2024.
This year’s Cannes Film Festival will also feature a special screening of Bono: Stories of Surrender, a documentary by director Andrew Dominik focusing on the U2 frontman.
The 2025 festival includes 21 films in the main competition, with the Palme d’Or to be awarded by a jury led by Juliette Binoche and including Halle Berry and Succession star Jeremy Strong.
Additional Reporting: AFP
