From a restored Peleshyan retrospective to Simon Abkarian's turn as De Gaulle and a studio's bet on Armenian filmmakers in 2027, this year's festival held three very different visions of Armenian cinema at once. Notes from Cannes by film critic Diana Martirosyan.
Text: Diana Martirosyan
Armenian presence at this year's Cannes Film Festival extended far beyond red carpets and networking events, revealing itself through several very different but interconnected cinematic spaces: restoration, historical memory, international co-production, and emerging talent.
One of the festival's most meaningful Armenian events became the "Peleshyan Project," presented within Cannes Classics at the Buñuel Theatre, one of Cannes' most cinephile-oriented venues, traditionally dedicated to restored classics, films about cinema itself, and conversations with major filmmakers and film historians. The programme focused on the work of Artavazd Peleshyan, presented by Cannes as "the father of distance montage."
Under the director's supervision, the restoration project was launched by Coproduction Office in partnership with Cineteca di Bologna, with the participation of the Cinema Foundation of Armenia, the Public Television Company of Armenia, VGIK, and Belarusfilm, alongside additional support from ZDF/ARTE, ArMa Media Production, and the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.
Five films were screened together: "Land of the People" (1966), "The Beginning" (1967), "We" (1969), "The Inhabitants" (1970), and "The Seasons" (1975). Particularly fascinating were the earlier student works, rarely seen even by Armenian audiences. Watching them today feels almost like witnessing the formation of Peleshyan's cinematic language in real time.
"Land of the People" already demonstrates his fascination with rhythm, labor, and collective human movement, transforming everyday urban work into visual poetry. "The Beginning," centered around the October Revolution, reveals his early experimentation with archive footage and emotional montage, while "We" directly addresses the Armenian people and the trauma of genocide, turning historical imagery into something deeply personal and philosophical.
Perhaps most radical even today is "The Inhabitants," constructed entirely around animals without human presence, where editing itself becomes the emotional engine of the film. And finally "The Seasons," arguably one of Peleshyan's most internationally recognized works, portrays Armenian farmers and their relationship with nature through a cinematic flow where Armenian folk music collides with Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" in a surprisingly free-form structure.
What made the screening especially moving was hearing Peleshyan himself briefly address the audience. His speech was minimal and entirely focused on montage. He spoke about editing as the central principle of his artistic thinking, the approach that eventually evolved into what became known as "distance montage." In many ways, the simplicity of his speech reflected the essence of his cinema itself: sparse in words, but deeply concentrated in meaning.
Unlike the gala premieres dominating Cannes headlines, Cannes Classics attracts a different audience: viewers invested not only in contemporary cinema, but in film history, restoration, and cinematic language itself. The Buñuel Theatre has long become one of the festival's key spaces for cinephiles, critics, and industry professionals interested in cinema beyond competition politics and celebrity culture.
Another major Armenian connection this year emerged through Simon Abkarian in "De Gaulle: Résistance," Antonin Baudry's out-of-competition historical epic running nearly 160 minutes. The film revisits Charles de Gaulle during World War II while intertwining his story with that of Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle, a young resistance member who assassinated Admiral François Darlan in Algiers.
There is something intentionally old-fashioned about the film's scale and tone, a classical wartime blockbuster more interested in political conviction, moral leadership, and historical spectacle than in formal experimentation. In some ways, De Gaulle himself is portrayed as one of those almost romantic 20th century figures stubbornly attempting to preserve national identity and dignity in the face of collapse. The film even evokes a subtle Don Quixote-like quality in his struggle against overwhelming historical forces.
For audiences in smaller countries such as Armenia, these kinds of figures inevitably resonate in a particular way. The film does not romanticize De Gaulle as a flawless leader, but presents him as a complicated, sentimental, and morally stubborn personality navigating political chaos, alliances, and defeat.
Abkarian gives the French leader an unexpectedly human dimension, balancing authority with irony, vulnerability, and moments of exhaustion. It also feels like the kind of international project that may introduce him to many critics and journalists unfamiliar with his earlier work despite his long and respected career in French and Armenian cultural spaces.
The cast itself adds considerable weight to the production: Benoît Magimel, Niels Schneider, Mathieu Kassovitz, Anamaria Vartolomei, and Simon Russell Beale all appear throughout the film, which constantly shifts between political negotiations, wartime strategy, and resistance movements inside occupied France. Interestingly, the film remains heavily focused on the France–Britain relationship through De Gaulle and Churchill, while the Soviet Union is almost entirely absent from its geopolitical perspective.
"De Gaulle: Résistance" ultimately works less as a festival film than as accessible, large-scale historical cinema for broad audiences, which makes its out-of-competition Cannes slot feel entirely logical. Yet placed alongside the Peleshyan retrospective, it created an unexpectedly interesting contrast between two radically different cinematic approaches: one monumental and narrative-driven, the other philosophical, poetic, and formally revolutionary.
Armenia's cinematic presence in Cannes this year also extended toward the future. During La Semaine de la Critique, Next Step Studio officially announced that Armenia will become its focus country in 2027.
Continuing the concept initiated by La Factory at the Directors' Fortnight in 2013, the programme supports "the emergence of new voices in cinema around the world." Each edition takes place in a different country and brings together emerging local and international filmmakers to co-write and co-direct short films. Previous editions explored Taiwan, Chile, Finland, South Africa, Lebanon, Tunisia, the Balkans, Portugal, the Philippines, and Brazil.
The first edition under its new title, Next Step Studio, focused on Indonesia and premiered during the 65th edition of La Semaine de la Critique. Curated by Dominique Welinski, the initiative continues to position itself as one of the rare international platforms genuinely investing in filmmakers transitioning from short films to feature filmmaking.
The Armenian edition of the programme will be organized in collaboration with Armenian film institutions, including The Film Directors and Producers Guild of Armenia (FDPGA) and the Cinema Foundation of Armenia, with the support of the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports of Armenia.
Placed alongside the Peleshyan retrospective and Simon Abkarian's major appearance in "De Gaulle: Résistance," the announcement added yet another layer to Armenian presence at Cannes this year, one rooted not only in heritage and internationally recognized Armenian figures, but also in the future generation of Armenian cinema and its growing integration into international film networks.