Cannes 2026 (Critics’ Week): La Gradiva | Interview with Marine Atlan

The biggest discovery out of Cannes 2026 came from the Critics’ Week section, where Marine Atlan’s evocative drama of French high school teenagers navigate their intense emotions through the streets of Naples during a school trip in her debut feature length film, La Gradiva. Focusing on three students, Toni (Colas Quignard), James (Mitia Capellier-Audat), and Suzanne (Suzanne Gerin), desire and yearning bleed over the course of 145 minutes as they spend the last days of high school in a historic city where the eruptions of the past are ready to burst through the three as the unspoken end is near for them. 

A love story, identity, and the past intertwine into an investigation of these teens’ lives as they are reaching this transformative age. James, the privileged stud has it all in life, while Toni, the impulsive, but troubled one secretly is infatuated with James, which Suzanne, the introverted, intelligent outcast, feels the same. The school trip plays as a last moment for the three, leading to a seductive and emotional journey that one won’t ever forget. Marine Atlan’s delicate and precise film is a heartbreaking ode to the past and the youth, capturing the essence of love and loss through an unconditional lens.

We were delighted to sit down with Marine Atlan for a short chat to talk about her monumental debut feature, winner of the Critics’ Week Grand Prize, La Gradiva.

“It’s a first film that sums up 35 years of desire of cinema and I tried to put everything in it.”

Film Fest Report: What was the inspiration in making your first feature length film?

Marine Atlan: Well, the spark was to see what would come out of an encounter between a territory that’s hosting ruins that are 2000 years old and what a group of contemporary teenagers in 2025 would get out of it.

Film Fest Report: How important was it for the film to only take place in Naples?

Marine Atlan: I wanted to start the movie in a moving mode, which is in a train and to have the time of the film as the time of the journey of the school trip. Of course, there is the evocation of the past through what we don’t see on screen and reference to the past of all of them and of the future. It’s these five days of the school trip which is short, but very dense.

Film Fest Report: What was the collaboration of the screenwriting with Anne Brouillet and cinematography with Pierre Mazoyer?

Marine Atlan: As for writing, I wrote the script first and then Anne stepped in later because in writing, I can imagine every single shot of the film and the mise-en-scene. The staging of the film itself is in my mind. From a pacing and rhythmic point of view, I needed to write it first. Then collaborating with Anne, we thought of a dialectic collaboration. She fine tuned the dialogue and set the structure for the film. But it had to be my own words because to me, the words are the images.

For the cinematography, it was similar work. It was very important to me to preserve the gestures and to detail every single shot. But with precious dialogue, she (Pierre Mazoyer) was concerned with the light, the matter of things, the artistic direction. Once on set, for instance, she would take care of the light with the electrician, but it was very much a dialogue between Pierre and I. Also, she framed a lot of the film, although I was always behind the camera.

Film Fest Report: Is your directing more planned out or intuitive for the actors? Especially with the camera’s precise movements.

Marine Atlan: It depended on different moments. The opening sequence in the train was very freeing in a way because I was following all the different exchange of gazes, tensions, and suspense that was detailed in the screenplay. While the first part of the film was open to improvisation, especially with the kids’ dialogues. I followed the dialogue and voices that came to them. 

Then, in the second part of the film, as we move towards the tragedy, at that point, the camera movement had to be very precise to create this melodramatic tension that was necessary for the storytelling. It was a constant working with the actors and their performance. If I let them improvise, then I had to rewrite the dialogue. It was all a collective effort in a way. But in general, with the development of the film and the arc, we were moving towards a clearer dialogue and structure.

Film Fest Report: Being your first feature length film, were you nervous or confident in the process since the film feels very accomplished and doesn’t feel like a first film given the grand scope and runtime?

Marine Atlan: I don’t know if I was confident. I was very faithful. It’s a first film that sums up 35 years of desire of cinema and I tried to put everything in it. It’s a project that needed a lot of time to be developed and its polyphony of different voices to different generations. So, it’s a very dense film and I put all my soul into it.

Our team is on site for the 79th Cannes Film Festival, from May 12 to 23, 2026.