French filmmaker Léa Mysius has always had a sharp instinct for the strange charge underneath intimate relationships. Her 2017 feature debut “Ava” announced her as one of the more compelling French filmmakers of her generation, and “The Five Devils” pushed her further into a sensual, eerie zone where family history, desire, and genre suggestion seemed to bleed into one another. Now she’s back at Cannes with “Histoires de la nuit,” also known internationally as “Night Stories,” a new Competition title that appears to keep her in that same unstable territory between domestic drama and psychological unease.
READ MORE: 27 Most Anticipated Films From The 2026 Cannes Film Festival
Set on remote marshland, the film centers on Thomas (Bastien Bouillon), Nora (Hafsia Herzi), and their teenage daughter, Ida (Tawba El Gharchi), whose isolated life leaves them with little social contact beyond Cristina (Monica Bellucci), an Italian painter and their only neighbor. As the two households prepare a surprise birthday party for Nora, disturbances begin to unsettle the quiet, and a creeping sense of dread rolls across the marsh. The film’s cast also includes Benoît Magimel, Paul Hamy, Alan Delhaye, Servane Ducorps, and Tatia Tsuladze.
That setup fits Mysius’ sensibility. “The Five Devils” turned memory, family secrets, and the supernatural into something tactile and emotionally volatile. At the same time, “Night Stories” works from a similarly charged premise: a small group of people, a closed-off landscape, and something uncanny pressing against the surface of ordinary life.
Mysius has also built a formidable résumé as a screenwriter, collaborating with Arnaud Desplechin on “Ismael’s Ghosts” and “Oh Mercy!,” Jacques Audiard on “Paris, 13th District” and “Emilia Pérez,” and Claire Denis on “Stars at Noon.” That kind of range—moving between Desplechin’s restless character studies, Audiard’s genre-fluid dramas, and Denis’ sensual uncertainty—makes her return as a director feel especially intriguing.
Mysius wrote and directed the film, which represents her biggest Cannes platform yet as a filmmaker. “Ava” premiered at the festival in 2017 and won the SACD Award, while “The Five Devils” screened in Directors’ Fortnight in 2022. “Night Stories” now brings her to the main Competition, where its mix of isolation, family tension, and marshland atmosphere should make it one of the more intriguing French entries in the lineup.
“Night Stories” runs 114 minutes and screens in Competition at Cannes. Watch the trailer below.
