‘The Animal Kingdom’, ‘Anatomy Of A Fall’ lead nominations for France’s Cesar Awards

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'The Animal Kingdom'

Source: StudioCanal

‘The Animal Kingdom’

Thomas Cailley’s sci-fi thriller The Animal Kingdom and Justin Triet’s Oscar-nominated courtroom drama Anatomy Of A Fall rose to the top of the nominations at France’s Cesar awards.

The Animal Kingdom, a supernatural twist on a father-son drama that first premiered at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard, has been nominated for 12 awards including best film and will vie in that category against the five-time Academy-award nominated, Palme d’Or-winning Anatomy Of A Fall with 11 nominations, alongside Cédric Kahn’s The Goldman Case, Jeanne Herry’s All Your Faces and Jean-Baptiste Durand’s Junkyard Dogs.

Cailley, Triet, Kahn and Herry also earned a nomination for best directing alongside veteran French filmmaker Catherine Breillat for another Cannes-premiering title Last Summer.

Scroll down for the full list of nominations

The Academy said it saw record 71.9% participation for its first round of voting in what has been a competitive year, with 3,375 of its 4,694 members taking part.

All Your Faces earned nine nominations and dominated the best supporting actress category with Leila Bekhti, Elodie Bouchez, Adele Exarchopoulos and Moiou Miou all earning nominations for their role in the drama about perpetrators and victims of crimes who meet each other as part of a French restorative justice plan. Galatea Bellugi was also nominated in the category for Junkyard Dog, a friendship drama that earned an impressive seven nominatio

In a year when box office hits such as Oppenheimer and Barbie have earned awards accolades and a slew of Oscar nominations, even French voters, who traditionally prefer to honour more arthouse fare, have opted to nominate films that have also been commercial successes.

The Animal Kingdom has sold over 1 million tickets (Studiocanal), Anatomy Of A Fall has earned 1.3 million admissions (Le Pacte) and All Your Faces (Studiocanal) 1.17 million.

Fillms that debuted at Cannes 2023 were well represented in the Cesar nominations. They include The Goldman Case, that revisits the 1975 trial of leftist radical Pierre Goldman, taking eight nominations,as well as Breillat’s Last Summer, Frederic Tellier’s biopic L’Abbe Pierre: A Century of Devotion, Valerie Donzelli’s Just The Two of Us, Anna Novion’s Marguerite’s Theorem and Iris Kaltenbach’s The Rapture.

France’s Oscar entry and Cannes best director winner Tran Anh Hung’s The Taste Of Things was nominated for best cinematography, set design and costumes but missed out in the acting, directing and best film categories.

Cesar members will choose from the 111 nominations in 24 categories in a second round of voting that runs from February 1 until February 23, just ahead of the awards’ 49^th ceremony that will take place at Paris’ Olympia theatre where Christopher Nolan and Agnès Jaoui will receive honourary César awards.

Cesars extends ban on those accused of sexual assault

This year, the Cesar academy has said it is amplifying its efforts to condemn sexual assault in the industry and is banning anyone charged with “acts of violence” from all of its events moving forward. This is an extension of the ceremony ban announced last year on any nominees who have been accused or convicted of acts of sexual violence. This year it extends to events including the nominees dinner and producers award dinner in February, as well as prize ceremonies associated with schools and short films.

While keeping in mind “the presumption of innocence” the Cesar academy confirmed “ the accused or convicted person will not be invited to any of these events.”

However, if following the first two rounds of voting, academy members opt to award a César to anyone subject to legal proceedings, the talent will be able to receive the award but will not be welcome at the ceremony to accept the award on stage. Additionally, no one can make a speech on his or her behalf, nor can the accused be a part of any publicity of press coverage on the academy’s media platforms.

The academy said discussions will continue following the 2024 ceremony “in order to evaluate this new system and to study all possible ways of expanding it, while strictly respecting the rights of the persons involved”.

Last year’s decision was sparked by its removal of Forever Young actor Sofiane Bennacer from the shortlist for the ‘Revelations’ prize after he was accused of rape and sexual assault. He denied the allegations,

Sexual crimes in the French film world have been a hot topic of debate followinga bombshell documentary featuring accusations of sexual assault against Gerard Depardieu. Additionally, Samuel Theis, a potential nominee in the acting categories for his role in Anatomy Of A Fall, was accused of rape on the set of his upcoming feature film Je Le Jure.

Judith Godrèche recently called out director Benoît Jacquot for what she described as “an inappropriate relationship” when she was just 14 years old and he was 40, that inspired her A24-Arte series Icon Of French Cinema.

Cesar nominations 2024

Best film

Anatomy Of AFall, dir. Justine Triet
Junkyard Dog, dir. Jean-Baptiste Durand
All Your Faces, dir. Jeanne Herry
The Goldman Case, dir. Cédric Kahn
The Animal Kingdom, dir. Thomas Cailley

Best directing

Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall
Catherine Breillat for Last Summer
Jeanne Herry for All Your Faces
Cédric Kahn for The Goldman Case
Thomas Caillet for The Animal Kingdom

Best actress

Marion Cotillard in Little Girl Blue
Léa Drucker in Last Summer
Virginie Efira in Just The Two of Us
Hafsia Herzi in The Rapture
Sandra Hüller in Anatomy of a Fall

Best actor

Romain Duris in The Animal Kingdom
Benjamin Lavernhe in L’Abbé Pierre: A Century of Devotion
Melvil Poupaud in Just The Two of Us
Raphaël Quenard in Yannick
Arieh Worthalter in The Goldman Case

Best supporting actress

Leila Bekhti in All Your Faces
Galatea Bellugi in Junkyard Dogs
Elodie Bouchez in All Your Faces
Adèle Exarchopoulos in All Your Faces
Miou Miou in All Your Faces

Best supporting actors

Swann Arlaud in Anatomy of a Fall
Anthony Bajon in Junkyard Dogs
Arthur Harari in The Goldman Case
Pio Marmaï in Yannick
Antoine Reinartz in Anatomy of a Fall

Most promising actress

Céleste Brunnquell in No Love Lost
Kim Higelin in Consent
Suzanne Jouannet in The Path of Excellence
Rebecca Marder in Grand Expectations
Ella Rumpf in Marguerite’s Theorem

Most promising actor

Julien Frison in Marguerite’s Theorem
Paul Kircher in The Animal Kingdom
Samuel Kircher in Last Summer
Milo Machado-Graner in Anatomy of a Fall
Raphaël Quenard in Junkyard Dogs

Best original screenplay

Justine Triet, Arthur Harari for Anatomy of a Fall
Jean-Baptiste Durand for Junkyard Dogs
Jeanne Herry for All Your Faces
Nathalie Hertzberg, Cédric Kahn for The Goldman Case
Thomas Cailley, Pauline Munier for The Animal Kingdom

Best adapted screenplay

Valérie Donzelli, Audrey Diwan for Just The Two of Us
Vanessa Filho for Consent
Catherine Breillat for Last Summer

Best score

Gabriel Yared for Just The Two of Us
Delphine Malausséna for Junkyard Dogs
Vitalic for Disco Boy
Andrea Laszlo de Simone for The Animal Kingdom
Guillaume Roussel for The Three Musketeers (part 1 : D’Artagnan/part 2 : Milady)

Best special effects

Thomas Duval for Acid
Lise Fischer, Cédric Fayolle for The Mountain
Cyrille Bonjean, Bruno Sommier, Jean-Louis Autret for The Animal Kingdom
Olivier Cauwet for The Three Musketeers (Part 1 and 2)

Best sound

Julien Sicart, Fanny Martin, Jeanne Delplancq, Olivier Goinard for Anatomy of a Fall
Rémi Daru, Guadalupe Cassius, Loic Prian, Marc Doisne for All Your Faces
Erwan Kerzanet, Sylvain Malbrant, Olivier Guillaume for The Goldman Case
Fabrice Osinski, Raphaël Sohier, Matthieu Fichet, Niels Barletta for The Animal Kingdom

Best editing