‘The Eight Mountains’ Directors Felix van Groeningen, Charlotte Vandermeersch Discuss Cannes Competition Title, Debut Trailer (EXCLUSIVE)
variety.comNick Vivarelli International CorrespondentFriendship, mountains, growing up, and our changed rapport with the planet in the wake of the pandemic are the main elements in Cannes competition title “The Eight Mountains” by Belgian directors Felix van Groeningen (“Beautiful Boy”) and Charlotte Vandermeersch. (Watch the trailer above.)The film is based on an Italian novel of the same title by Paolo Cognetti.
It has won multiple awards in Italy and France and is also the author’s first book published in the U.S. “The Eight Mountains” is a coming-of-age tale set over three decades about two young Italian boys — one, named Pietro, who is the son of a chemist, the other, Bruno, of a stonemason — who spend their childhoods together in a secluded Alpine village roaming the surrounding peaks and valleys before their paths diverge.
Many years later, they reconnect in the same place. The film marks the first foray into Italian-language filmmaking for Van Groeningen who, prior to “Beautiful Boy,” his English-language debut, broke out with Oscar-nominated “The Broken Circle Breakdown,” which is in Dutch, followed by the Sundance prize-winning “Belgica.”Van Groeningen teamed up on “Eight Mountains” with Vandermeersch, his partner in life, an actor and writer now making her directorial debut.
Read more on variety.com
