{"id":329158,"date":"2025-12-04T02:21:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-04T02:21:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/329158\/"},"modified":"2025-12-04T02:21:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-04T02:21:10","slug":"natalie-portman-ugo-bienvenue-talk-arco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/329158\/","title":{"rendered":"Natalie Portman, Ugo Bienvenue Talk ‘Arco’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFew films end with a line that doubles as a mission statement, distilling both the story\u2019s themes and the creators\u2019 intents. \u201cArco<\/a>\u201d fits the bill, captured in its final words: \u201cI wish that things would change.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cArt and activism come from the same place,\u201d says producer Natalie Portman<\/a>, citing Ava DuVernay. \u201cBoth imagine a reality beyond the one we\u2019re living in. That\u2019s very present in this film, which creates something beautiful while imagining a future brighter than the one we see today.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tProduced by MountainA \u2014 run by Portman and her partner Sophie Mas<\/a> \u2014 and Remembers, led by director Ugo Bienvenue<\/a> and his creative collaborator Felix de Givry, \u201cArco\u201d has charted a remarkable path. It premiered at Cannes, was acquired by Neon<\/a>, won the top prize at Annecy, received three European Film Award nominations, and continues to screen at festivals including Marrakech<\/a>, with a robust awards push underway.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cA lot of science fiction is about wanting things to stay the same, projecting today\u2019s world onto the future,\u201d says Bienvenue. \u201cMaybe we\u2019re one of the first generations in a long time that truly wants to go in a different direction. We\u2019re trying to find new paths because the ones we imagined before aren\u2019t very pleasant.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tAn acclaimed animator and comic book artist \u2014 who had designed the poster for the Annecy Animation Festival years before winning its top prize \u2014 Bienvenue began work on his feature debut with a single idea: to envision a utopian future shaped by the remembrance of things past. From that spark, a sci-fi fable took shape: the tale of a boy from 2932 who rides rainbows through time and forms an unlikely bond with a lonely young girl in 2075.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt was the most beautiful thing I\u2019d ever heard,\u201d adds Portman. \u201cI was blown away by the idea and the way he described imagination. It\u2019s incredibly evocative \u2014 creating something that feels like it has always existed, as if the future is a memory. That was the moment Sophie and I looked at each other and said, \u2018This has to exist. Whatever it takes, this has to exist.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n

\n\tThe project began as a lifeline. During the long, restless days of the 2020 lockdown, Bienvenue turned to creativity as an escape. He imagined a child from a freer, happier future, thrown back into troubled times, and quickly got sketching. Soon, he enlisted his producing partner and co-writer, Felix de Givry \u2014 best known for his roles in Mia Hansen-L\u00f8ve\u2019s \u201cEden\u201d and Olivier Assayas\u2019 \u201cSomething in the Air.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cUgo drew while I wrote,\u201d de Givry recalls. \u201cWe really made the film exist internally first. Normally, we share projects with the world much earlier \u2014 for funding, development, all that \u2014 but this time we stayed in our small studio with Ugo for months, crafting the film almost in secret, before it even existed for anyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe duo bucked convention, channeling their efforts into a 50-minute animatic in place of the traditional script and pitch deck. As \u201990s kids, they poured into the project the influences that formed them, blending the pop-culture DNA of Spielberg, Zemeckis, and Miyazaki with the storybook mythos of \u201cPeter Pan,\u201d \u201cPinocchio,\u201d and \u201cThe Little Prince.\u201d The result felt at once familiar and fresh to their generational peers. <\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen we saw the original animatic, it radiated pure entertainment, full of joy, humor, adventure, and extraordinary visuals,\u201d says Portman. \u201cI immediately felt that Ugo\u2019s vision would resonate. The story of two kids on an adventure has a classic \u201980s-American-export structure, yet it carries a distinctly French and uniquely Ugo sensibility. The hand-drawn 2D animation is breathtaking, and in today\u2019s world, we crave that human-to-human touch.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHot off the Cannes launch of \u201cMay December,\u201d Portman and her MountainA co-founder Sophie Mas discovered \u201cArco\u201d at an auspicious moment, just as the producing partners, with footholds in both the U.S. and France, were planning the next steps for their nascent company. Shortly after joining the project, they decided to establish a Gallic outpost to produce their first animated title through the French ecosystem, all while taking cues from a more American, gung-ho approach.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIn the U.S., there\u2019s more of a \u2018don\u2019t wait\u2019 mentality, whereas in France, films often develop according to the opinions of many stakeholders,\u201d Mas explains. \u201cIt was fascinating to combine our drive to act quickly with the value of the French ecosystem, which is incredibly rich. We also realized that if we wanted to pursue other projects\u2014either with Remembers or other French directors \u2014 this would create a framework to develop work outside the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n

\n\tAdopting a hybrid model ultimately granted Bienvenue a level of creative freedom rarely found in either system.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAnimation in France tends to be very subject-oriented, with little adventure or sci-fi, and often doesn\u2019t focus on pleasure and fun,\u201d Bienvenue says. \u201cBut this movie was meant for everybody from the very beginning. In France, people often start thinking small because budgets are lower than in Hollywood. It\u2019s our job to push boundaries, to show that we can go further and aim higher.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tDe Givry agrees, noting that the film\u2019s unusual production path drew strength from both approaches. \u201cFrom my perspective, the film wouldn\u2019t have had the same life or launch if it had been done solely within the American system,\u201d he says. \u201cFrench auteur animation allows for a trajectory with international sales, distributors, and other supports that are essential for launching such a project. That reinforced our ambitious goal to finish the film for Cannes 2025 \u2014 which is almost miraculous for an animated feature \u2014because we knew this film needed to exist right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n

\n\tIndeed, the writers imagined two futures: a distant 2932 in which humanity has finally broken its cycles of ecological harm, and a nearer 2075 that amplifies the climate instability we already face. Yet during the film\u2019s relatively brisk production, reality began to catch up to \u2014 and at times surpass \u2014 de Givry and Bienvenue\u2019s darker projections. <\/p>\n

\n\tAt recent Los Angeles screenings, the team met filmgoers whose lives have been upended by wildfires even more devastating than those Bienvenue depicts on screen. For the filmmakers, these encounters were both sobering and unexpectedly cathartic, connecting their time-travel fantasia to the urgency of the present.<\/p>\n

\n\tFor her part, Portman was especially thrilled to watch the film with two particular audience members. \u201cMy kids are eight and 14, and they loved it,\u201d she beams. \u201cIt also sparked important conversations between us: why are the parents not there, what is the role of technology and caretaking, and what platforms we might need to heal the Earth. Each question led to new and amazing discussions.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRemembers \u2013 MountainA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Few films end with a line that doubles as a mission statement, distilling both the story\u2019s themes and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":329159,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[167210,88,167211,206,59853,23243,71825,167212],"class_list":["post-329158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-arco","tag-entertainment","tag-marrakech","tag-movies","tag-natalie-portman","tag-neon","tag-sophie-mas","tag-ugo-bienvenue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/329159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}