Mediawan, BYD Celebrate Ukrainian Drama ‘Honeymoon’ in Cannes

Ukrainian filmmaker Zhanna Ozirna’s claustrophobic marital drama “Honeymoon” won the inaugural Build Your Dream award at a chic Cannes ceremony atop the JW Marriott on May 14.

Set at the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war, the intimate thriller follows Kyiv newlyweds trapped in their apartment and cut off from the outside world, a situation endangering both their lives and their relationship. The project draws on testimonies Ozirna gathered in the war’s early days, including accounts of families forced to crawl across their floors to avoid being seen.

An international jury chaired by Chinese filmmaker Chen Kaige and composed of Mélanie Laurent, Hafsia Herzi, Yann Demange and Première France editor-in-chief Thierry Chèze awarded the winning director an angular trophy made by Parisian designer Victoria Wilmotte, alongside a $46,539 grant for the filmmaker’s next feature.

Ozirna is now developing two follow-ups, including the historical drama “Ground Zero,” which follows the rise of communism in Ukraine, and “Intimacy,” which tracks wounded and disabled veterans of the ongoing war as they learn to navigate — and find pleasure in — their new bodies.

“I began making this film with the desire to speak about my generation — young people who are creative and intellectually free, whose lives have been profoundly shaken by war,” said the filmmaker as she collected the prize. “At a time when independent cinema in Ukraine has become especially difficult, this support means a great deal to me. I believe cinema has the power to preserve memory and human experience, and this award gives me the strength to continue exploring human nature through the language of film.”

The Build Your Dream award is the result of a collaboration between French entertainment giant Mediawan and Chinese automaker BYD, now the world’s leading manufacturer of electric vehicles. The annual prize spotlights debut features released in French theaters between two editions of the Cannes Film Festival, with a mission to champion new voices in contemporary cinema.

Mediawan CEO Pierre-Antoine Capton and BYD Vice President Stella Li presided over the ceremony on the elegant Albane terrace, where the prize was first conceived a year ago when they met and quickly found common ground. Capton and Li renewed the partnership giving speeches at an awards ceremony hosted by Variety‘s Executive Editor of International, Elsa Keslassy, and former Cannes Film Festival president Pierre Lescure.

“The award is about two worlds coming together, and two people, Stella Li and Pierre-Antoine Capton, who are both trailblazers in their respective field,” said Keslassy in her introduction. “BYD, through innovation and technology, has become one of the most dynamic global companies of the past few years, and has become world’s leading electric car company. And Mediawan, celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, has built in just a decade one of Europe’s more exciting companies with a truly international footprint that brings together the best talent and producers, like Plan B and Chi-Fou-Mi which are presenting films here at Cannes.”

Earlier that day, the Mediawan backed “Fatherland” premiered in competition to strong reviews.

A stylish crowd turned out to toast the partnership and celebrate the new prize. On one side of the terrace, Plan B president Jeremy Kleiner, Oscar-winning filmmaker Florian Zeller, Palme d’Or winner Claude Lelouch and French actor Elsa Zylberstein clinked champagne glasses, while on the other, Gong Li posed before an emerald Denza Z9GT as a promotional film starring Daniel Craig played on loop.

Filmmaker Yann Demange — who directed the Craig car advert before serving on the inaugural Build Your Dream jury — told Variety the award is designed to address a structural industry problem: promising filmmakers who manage to get their first film made often struggle even more to finance a second.

“There’s a massive falloff, and it’s heartbreaking,” he said. “Anything that gives them a bit of heat, traction, attention — really anything that makes it easier for them to finance that second film. We need to champion voices that manage to break through, because it’s a small miracle to make a film, and anyone who puts their heart into it and makes themselves vulnerable deserves to be celebrated.”

Jury president Chen Kaige — to this day the only Middle Kingdom filmmaker to win the Palme d’Or — connected the new prize to a structural issue he also sees in the rapidly expanding Chinese industry.

“We now have 90,000 screens, but fewer good movies are being made,” he told Variety. “Maybe because the market is so big, investors say that success means making a huge amount of money. If you want to express yourself, even if the story is beautiful, that’s not necessarily what they want. So for young directors who have dreams, it’s actually difficult to raise money for personal films.”

Kaige’s jury decided between 10 selected films, meeting over Zoom to deliberate. Actor and filmmaker Mélanie Laurent said topicality was a key driver of the discussion.

“When you decide on a movie for Cannes, you need to talk a little bit about the world and what’s happening today,” she explained. “[‘Honeymoon’] is a movie with emotion, beautiful shots, amazing actors, but also [a strong] subject matter. I will remember one scene for the rest of my life.”

She also suggested the inaugural winner was a relatively unanimous choice — in contrast to her experience on Spike Lee’s 2021 Cannes competition jury. “We definitely didn’t agree on many things,” she laughed. “But it’s fun also to fight, because otherwise it’s too easy.”