Three feature docs and one doc hybrid are selected for the Cannes sidebar section dedicated to independent, ground-breaking cinema.
These are French Tom Fontenille’s A Secret Heart; French/Iranian Mahsa Karampour’s Dans La Gueule de l’Ogre; Detention by Guillaume Massart and the Swiss/French co-pro hybrid Summer Drift (Virages) by Céline Carridroit and Aline Suter.
“This year’s program reflects both the alarming madness of our times and our infinite capacity to cope with it,” the ACID programmers collectively write [translation from ACID homepage].
“Questioning our institutions, understanding the feeling of exile, rethinking our relationship with the places we inhabit and the people around us; striving to please at all costs, dying in order to reinvent oneself, and letting a camera reveal us to the world as we dreamed ourselves to be: whether through humour, fiction, or attention to detail, filmmakers expose the dysfunctions running through our societies and their impact on each individual. The films presented are all gestures that bring us together—stories rooted in a poetic reality that is joyful, unexpected, but above all free and unformatted. They thus emerge as powerful acts of resistance—and of hope.”
ACID documentary selection 2026
- A Secret Heart (Cœur Secret) by Tom Fontenille (85 Min – France – 2026). Synopsis: “Over the last four years, Lilou left her secret life behind, becoming a 64-year-old woman who enjoys DIY, gardening, cycling and looking after her grandchildren. As I accompanied her through her transformation, I filmed a family healing its wounds and reinventing a place for everyone. This is my family, Lilou is my father.”
- Dans La Gueule De L’ogre by Mahsa Karampour (86 Min – France – 2026). Synopsis: “I can’t quite grasp the adventurous life of my brother Siavash, so far from my own. While I have just become French and he is about to become American, far from our native Iran, we are searching for common ground.”
- Detention (La Détention) by Guillaume Massart (132 Min – France – 2026). Synopsis: “Open a door. Handle a crisis. Write an incident report. At France’s prison officer academy, hundreds of men and women learn to become prison guards. Their words begin to mirror the institution. Their movements sharpen. What once felt uncertain becomes routine. Doubt slowly fades from their faces.”
- Summer Drift (Virages) by Céline Carridroit & Aline Suter (89 Min – Switzerland, France – 2026). Synopsis: “It’s summer in Geneva. Johanna works on the assembly line of a luxury watch factory and she’s not going on vacation. As she considers getting rid of her old VW Beetle, she decides instead to bring it back to life and confront the world of mechanics that once rejected her.”
The programmers continue of the overall ACID selection: “We were 13 filmmakers who watched several hundred films and selected nine for the programme. Among them are six debut feature films, and as every year, special attention has been given to films without distributors, which share top billing.
“We look forward to welcoming you to Cannes from May 13 to 22 to unveil this programme. More than ever, these moments of exchange around films—but not only films—are precious to us.
“We will also support the films throughout the year in cinemas, in collaboration with our educational partners, our member audiences, and our network of young ambassadors, not to mention international festivals. In the meantime, we look forward to seeing you again in Cannes, at the Café des cinéastes, on the Croisette, and in the theaters!”
