Sean Penn is standing in solidarity with the writers guild, whose members are currently on strike to fight for “My full support is with the writers guild,” Penn said on Friday during the Cannes press conference for his latest movie “Black Flies.” A day prior, “Black Flies” premiered at the Palais, where it received a…

Taiwan-based Screenworks Asia is using the Cannes Market to launch international rights sales on “Lost in Perfection.” The film, previously titled “Love is a Bitch,” is a female-led psychological thriller that marks the live-action debut of Sung Hsin-ying, who is already established as an award-winning animation director. The story follows a TV anchor, played by…

Mixed martial arts thriller “Glass Dragon” has been picked up for international sales by MPI Media. The company is launching the title at the Cannes Market. The film, now in post-production, is produced by Asia-facing Los Angeles company Eleven Arts and RE:Anime, a firm that adapts beloved anime series into captivating live-action films. “Glass Dragon”…

Actor Sebastian Stan has come on board to produce “Blue Banks,” the feature debut of Romanian director Andreea Cristina Borțun, whose 2021 short film “When Night Meets Dawn” premiered in Directors’ Fortnight. Pic follows Lavinia, a single mother trying to make a better life on her own terms for herself and her 13-year-old son, who…

Oscar-nominated Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania (“Beauty and the Dogs,” “The Man Who Sold His Skin”) is back in Cannes with “Four Daughters” a powerful drama that mixes documentary and fiction to delve into the story of Tunisia’s Olfa Hamrouni who rose to international prominence in April 2016 when she publicized the radicalization of her…

Austrian actor Helmut Berger, the groundbreaking star of European cinematic masterpieces such as Luchino Visconti’s “The Damned” and Vittorio De Sica’s “Garden of the Finzi-Continis,” has died at the age of 78. Berger died at home in Austria from natural causes. In one of European cinema’s most storied and creative periods, the 60s and 70s,…

Cannes Docs highlights Spain as part of its Docs in Progress program, featuring four documentaries that range from the avant-garde to the introspective. Spain’s doc filmmakers have labored to establish international footing — battling the stigma that the category is made up of dry narratives, productions strive for the robust funding granted to fiction. “There’s…

Spain’s Nostromo Pictures, producer of “Through My Window,” one of the most-watched non-English movies ever on Netflix, is producing “Control Room,” a female-led sci-fi action movie pitched by producer Adrián Guerra as “‘Aliens’ meets ‘The Guilty.’” Based on an original screenplay from Julien Deladrière, “Control Room” is directed by Luiso Berdejo, helmer of “The New Daughter,” starring…

Veteran Italian auteur Silvio Soldini (“Bread and Tulips,” “Emma”) is set to direct “The Tasters,” which will reconstruct the true untold story of the women conscripted to be Adolf Hitler’s food tasters. The Nazi-era drama — which will mark Soldini’s first foray into German-language cinema — is based on the bestselling book “At the Wolf’s…

TF1 Studio/ Newen Connect has picked up international sales rights to “Sarafina!,” the iconic South African musical-dance-drama that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 1992. “Sarafina!” was the first major film to be made in South Africa after the release of Nelson Mandela from his 27-year prison term. The film tells of the strength…