This “Ukraine Day” is a reminder of the commitment of artists, authors and journalists to tell the story of this conflict in the heart of Europe, which has been affecting the Ukrainian people and the world for 3 years now.

This program is a reminder of the commitment of the Festival de Cannes and its ability to tell the story of the world’s challenges, which are those of our future, through works of cinema.

By joining forces, France Télévisions, Brut. and the Festival de Cannes are affirming their desire to give voice to those who bear witness to contemporary realities and stand up for the truth.

This program dedicated to Ukraine will be held on Tuesday May 13 at the Palais des Festivals, in the theatres Buñuel and Bazin, and will bring together three works retracing the events and key figures of the conflict.

THE PROGRAMME

Tuesday, May 13, 10AM, salle Buñuel

Zelensky by Yves Jeuland, Lisa Vapné and Ariane Chemin (France 2025, 2h15)

Volodymyr Zelensky was born in 1978 in Kryvyï Rih, a major steel and mining center in Ukraine’s Russian-speaking east-central region. Raised as an atheist, as he should have been at the time, the Ukrainian president was first and foremost a Soviet boy. When he was 13, the USSR collapsed. His largely unpoliticized adolescence followed the hopes and chaos of an independent Ukraine, where crime and poverty flourished, while the future oligarchs appropriated a share of the country’s resources. In building courtyards, on improvised stages, his little troupe of friends, boys and girls, try their hand at stand-up comedy and song. The undisputed leader, Volodymyr Zelensky studies law to reassure his father, but puts most of his hyperactivity into writing and putting on shows.

Tuesday, May 13, 1:30PM, salle Bazin

Notre Guerre, a film by Bernard-Henri Lévy, directed by Bernard-Henri Lévy and Marc Roussel (2025, France-Ukraine, 1h18)

Between February and April 2025, Bernard-Henri Lévy and his co-director Marc Roussel filmed the Pokrovsk and Soumy fronts in eastern Ukraine. They followed the fighters of the Anne de Kyiv Brigade, armed by France. They filmed the daily lives of the inhabitants, bombarded by Russian forces terrorizing civilians on the eve of possible negotiations. They interview President Zelensky, who is reluctant to travel to Washington, and then watch the rebroadcast of the meeting with Ukrainian soldiers in a bunker. For the real heroes of the film are the anonymous fighters and civilians who hold their heads high in the face of adversity and suffering, and who are filmed on a daily basis. The film, the final part of Lévy’s “Ukrainian Quartet”, is a diary, peppered with flashbacks in which the author recalls the high points of this war that began in 2014.

Tuesday, May 13, 3:30PM, salle Bazin

2000 Meters to Andriivka by Mstyslav Chernov (Ukraine-USA, 2025, 1h51)

From the Academy Award–winning director of 20 Days in Mariupol comes an immersive and harrowing look at the mission of one Ukrainian platoon. Mstyslav Chernov’s commitment to documenting the devastation of his homeland and the gruelling efforts of Ukrainian forces to win back their territories is of the highest order. Despite the extremely high risk, Chernov joins soldiers on the front line in eastern Ukraine as they inch forward through a narrow strip of charred forest flanked by minefields in an effort to liberate the strategic village of Andriivka.