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“El Mal,” the show-stopping number sung by Zoe Saldaña in Netflix’s “Emilia Perez,” won the best song Oscar Sunday night for French songwriters Camille and Clément Ducol and their co-writer, the film’s director Jacques Audiard.

Later in the evening, English composer Daniel Blumberg won the original score Oscar for his music for Brady Corbet’s epic “The Brutalist.”

The song “El Mal,” in Audiard’s operatic drama, is a three-minute tour de force for Saldaña as lawyer Rita Castro, a fantasy in which she dances around a room filled with the rich and powerful, decrying the hypocrisy of those responsible for the murders of thousands of Mexicans during the drug wars.

Mick Jagger introduced the category, taking the stage to the strains of the Rolling Stones’ 1968 classic “Sympathy for the Devil.”

After thanking the audience and saying how pleased he was to present the award, he said, “Much as I love doing it,...

Actor-director Daniel Auteuil and key “Emilia Perez” collaborator Jean-Baptiste Pouilloux have set up their next features with Les Films Velvet, the auteur-focused production outfit behind this year’s Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Paris opener “The Musicians” as well as Rebecca Zlotowski’s upcoming, Jodie Foster-led thriller “Vie Privée.”

After last year’s Cannes-launched legal thriller “An Ordinary Case,” Auteuil will step back behind the camera for the World War II drama “Une Nuit” (“One Night”). Co-written by Auteuil and filmmaker Camille Lugan (“The Book of Joy”), the film follows the incredible true story of a 1942 effort to rescue more then one hundred Jewish children from a deportation camp just outside of Lyon. Les Films Velvet’s Frederic Jouve will produce alongside Adrien Nussenbaum.

An in-demand assistant director who has worked closely with Jacques Audiard, Zlotowski and Nadav Lapid, Pouilloux most recently led second unit on “Emilia Perez” before directing the Canal Plus series “Iris.

Exclusive: Daniel Auteuil, Virginie Efira, Mathieu Amalric, Vincent Lacoste and Luana Bajrami have been unveiled as supporting cast members in Rebecca Zlotowski’s murder mystery movie Vie Privée starring Jodie Foster.

The production has also unveiled the plotline for the film which follows renowned psychiatrist Lilian Steiner, played by previously-announced Foster, who mounts her own private investigation into the death of one of her patients, whom she is convinced has been murdered.

The supporting cast news and plot reveal comes as filming – running from September 30 to November 22 between Paris and Normandy – enters its third week.

The feature is Zlotowski’s sixth film after 2023 Venice Golden Lion contender Other People’s Children, An Easy Girl, Planetarium, Grand Central and Dear Prudence.

Zlotowski co-wrote the screenplay with Anne Berest, whose credits include Audrey Diwan’s Venice Golden Lion winner Happening and Other People’s Children, as well as long-time collaborator Gaëlle Macé.

The film...

The French box office rose 10.1% in September compared to the same month in 2023, with 9.86 million tickets sold (€71m based on an average ticket price of €7.20) according to estimates from the Cnc.

The rise was driven by Warner Bros’ Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice and a slew of Cannes releases.

However, the month was 11.3% down on the pre-pandemic 2017-2019 average – and September 2023 had been particularly weak, posting just 8.8 million admissions (€63.2m).

Nevertheless, the overall picture remained upbeat. Admissions for the first nine months of the year reached 127.68 million (€920m), down 4.6% year-on-year after a slow start. This was down to the summer bounceback, driven by...

The French box office rose 10.1% in September compared to the same month in 2023, with 9.86 million tickets sold (€71m based on an average ticket price of €7.20) according to estimates from the Cnc.

The rise was driven by Warner Bros’ Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, a slew of Cannes releases and a robust performance from Francis Ford Coppla’s Megalopolis.

However, the month was 11.3% down on the pre-pandemic 2017-2019 average – and September 2023 had been particularly weak, posting just 8.8 million admissions (€63.2m).

Nevertheless, the overall picture remained upbeat. Admissions for the first nine months of the year reached 127.68 million (€920m), down 4.6% year-on-year after a slow start.

French songwriting and composing duo Camille Dalmais and Clément Ducol have been presented with the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival Variety Artisan Award for composing the soundtrack for Jacques Audiard’s Netflix’s “Emilia Pérez.”

The duo will be feted as part of the TIFF’s 2024 class of tribute award honorees, which will also include Mike Leigh (awarded the TIFF Ebert Director Award) and Durga Chew-Bose (awarded the TIFF Emerging Talent Award).

Dalmais (“Corsage”) and Ducol (“Little Tickles”) are prominent figures in the French music scene. Dalmais is known for her vocal style and blending of pop, folk and avant-garde elements and Ducol for his creative arrangements and musical prowess.

Though Dalmais has found success with her solo albums, “Le Sac des Filles” and “Le Fil,” together they form a “dynamic duo, pushing the boundaries of contemporary French music.”

“Variety is honored to be giving Camille and Clément our annual...

British filmmaker Mike Leigh will be feted at this year’s Toronto Film Festival with the TIFF Ebert Director Award for career achievement. The announcement was made this morning by TIFF head Cameron Bailey.

Leigh returns to TIFF this year for the World Premiere of his 23rd film, Hard Truths, screening as part of the Special Presentations programme. He reunites with Academy Award nominee Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Secrets & Lies) in the pic which is described as an “intimate study of modern family life.” Hard Truths will be distributed by Bleecker Street in the US and by Mongrel Media in Canada. Leigh has had eight films in Official Selection at the festival, including Another Year, Happy-Go-Lucky, and Mr. Turner.

Named after legendary film critic Roger Ebert, previous recipients of the award include Martin Scorsese, Claire Denis, Ava DuVernay, Wim Wenders, and the late Agnès Varda.

The Canadian festival further announced this...

Studiocanal ex-Orange Studio (sic), the sales company in transition following Canal+’s acquisition of Orange Studio and Ocs earlier this year, has taken on All For One, the anticipated second feature from Camera d’Or-winning Divines director Houda Benyamina.

The comedy drama reteams Beyamina with Divines actresses Oulaya Amamra and Déborah Lukumuena who star alongside Daphné Patakia and Sabrina Ouazani. Set in France in 1625, All For One is a feminist retelling of The Three Musketeers and follows four women tasked with protecting the Queen of France.

Orange Studio’s head of sales Charlotte Boucon will be at the market selling the film,...

The Cannes Premiere section stocked up on films from France with Alain Guiraudie’s Misericorde among the mix, the Out of Competition section added a Canuck oddity from Winnipeger Guy Maddin and co., the Midnight Section Screenings landed Nicolas Cage starring The Surfer by Lorcan Finnegan and Sergei Loznitsa once again drops a docu film on the Croisette with an item in the Special Screenings section. Here are nineteen titles that dropped this morning:

Cannes Premiere

“C’est Pas Moi,” Leos Carax

“En Fanfare” (“The Matching Bang”), Emmanuel Courcol

“Everybody Loves Touda,” Nabil Ayouch

“Le Roman de Jim,” Arnaud Larrieu and Jean-Marie Larrieu

“Misericorde,” Alain Guiraudie

“Rendez-Vous Avec Pol Pot,” Rithy Panh

Out Of Competition

“Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” George Miller

“Horizon, an American Saga,” Kevin Costner

“Rumours,” Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson, Guy Maddin

“She’s Got No Name,” Chan Peter Ho-Sun

Midnight Screenings

“I, the Executioner,” Seung Wan Ryoo

“The Balconettes...