THE BALCONETTES
(Les Femmes au balcon)
CINEMA COMPETITION
HALLOWEEN NIGHT
TRUFFAUT THEATRE
Comedy / Horror / Thriller – Recommended 17+
THURSDAY OCTOBER 31
8:15 pm (Screening ends at 10:05 pm)
Presented in association with:
Mk2 Films
The Forge Entertainement
France Televisions
Screamfest Horror Film Festival
Women In Film
Special Screening | France | 2024 | Comedy, Horror, Thriller | 103 min | In French with English subtitles | Recommended 17+
Directed by: Noémie Merlant
Written by: Noémie Merlant, Céline Sciamma
Produced by: Pierre Guyard, Christophe Rossignon & Philip Boëffard (Nord-Ouest Production), France 2 Cinéma
Cinematography: Evgenia Alexandrova
Film Editing: Julien Lacheray
Original Score: Uèle Lamor
Cast: Souheila Yacoub (Ruby), Sanda Codreanu (Nicole), Noémie Merlant (Elise), Lucas Bravo (the neighbour across the street), Annie Mercier (the woman next door), Nadège Beausson-Diane (Denise), Henri Cohen (the gynecologist), Christophe Montenez (Paul)
International Sales: MK2 Films
US Distributor: The Forge Entertainment
US Release date: 2025
Temperatures are soaring in Marseille. Would-be novelist Nicole sits on her balcony in search of inspiration, but her mind keeps wandering to the hunky guy lurking in his window across the street… Enter Ruby, her cam-girl roommate, fresh from a threesome and equally smitten with their handsome neighbor… Then their actress-friend Elise turns up, dressed as a Marilyn-lookalike, literally smashing into the cute guy’s car. However, things spiral out of control when the sexy neighbor invites them all over for a drink… and the bloodbath begins. Actress-turned-director Noémie Merlant‘s absurdist second feature mixes broad comedy, Asian gore and sexual politics in this gleeful takedown of toxic masculinity and gender-based violence.
Actress Noémie Merlant has appeared in some fifty films and is a three-time César Award nominee, for her performances in Marie-Castille Mention-Schaar’s Heaven Will Wait (COLCOA 2017); Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), for which she garnered numerous festival awards and the Lumière Award for Best Actress; and Louis Garrel’s hilarious The Innocent (TAFFF 2022), for which she finally nabbed the prestigious Best Actress César Award. She turned to writing and directing with the short films Je suis une biche (2017) and Shakira (2019). She made her feature film directorial debut in 2021 with Mi iubita, mon amour, which she also starred in, and which premiered in competition in Cannes. The Balconettes also had its world premiere as a Midnight Screening in Cannes, in May of this year, and is presented at TAFFF prior to its December French theatrical release.
