Deauville 2026: Club Kid strikes a double blow, Méli-Mélo touches the heart

A party animal who became a dad, a mother who loses her memory, an adolescence crossed by mourning: Deauville ends a great edition by rewarding families in all their states.

It took a night king to turn off the lights. With Club Kidcrowned Grand Prix by the Roschdy Zem jury and also rewarded by the public, Jordan Firstman leaves Deauville with the winning double. A great way to end a good year, where American independent cinema will have found in family stories something to laugh, derail and hurt.

At Firstman, fatherhood arrives without warning in the middle of the party. The director, screenwriter and lead actor plays a New York party planner who one day discovers that he has a son. On the one hand, drugs, sex and difficult tomorrows; on the other, a child who suddenly needs to be taken care of. The starting point could announce the well-marked comedy of redemption. The interest lies in what Firstman injects into it: a queer culture, a taste for disorder and a tenderness that takes his character by surprise. Spotted in Rotting in the Sun and in the series I Love LAhe goes behind the camera with this first feature film where learning responsibility never extinguishes the pleasure.

The other beautiful double on the list goes to Hodgepodgeby Leah Nelson, Jury Prize and Critics’ Prize. Adapted from the autobiographical graphic story by Sarah Leavitt, this animated film tells the story of a young woman facing her mother’s Alzheimer’s disease. A formidable subject, to which drawing brings precious freedom: moving from everyday life to fantasy, giving form to what is slipping away, providing an escape or a capsule of humor in the midst of exhaustion and melancholy. The illness retains all its cruelty and the loved ones their clumsiness. This coexistence of the terrible and the trivial is the strength of a film seen in Cannes and Annecy but which triumphs here.

Grief also goes through Mouseawarded by the Révélation jury chaired by Lio. Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson follow a teenager who, after a tragedy, becomes closer to her best friend’s mother. In this Arkansas of the early 2000s, growing up means learning to live with absence. The film finds its material in this fragile bond between two beings separated by age and social environment.

Other Jury Prize, If I Go Will They Miss Meby Walter Thompson-Hernández, observes a father returning from prison through the eyes of his son. His somewhat naive lyricism, his visions and his insistent motives can divide. However, it continues the thread of this edition: how can we continue to love those who escape us? Under the neon lights or in memories, Deauville will often have asked the question. Correctly.

The complete winners of the 52nd Deauville festival

Grand Prize: Club Kidby Jordan Firstman.

Jury prize: Hodgepodgeby Leah Nelson, and If I Go Will They Miss Meby Walter Thompson-Hernández.

Revelation Prize: Mouseby Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson.

Audience Award: Club Kidby Jordan Firstman.

Critic’s Prize: Hodgepodgeby Leah Nelson.

CANAL+ price: Testby Sam McConnell.

Ornano-Valenti price: La Gradivaby Marine Atlan.