Hafsia Herzi’s Cannes Prizewinning Film ‘The Little Sister’ Picks Up France’s Louis Delluc Award From French Critics

After winning an award at Cannes where it premiered in competition, Hafsia Herzi‘s film “The Little Sister” has officially kicked off the French awards season, taking the Louis Delluc prize from critics.

The ceremony was hosted today (Dec. 10) at the Fouquet’s restaurant on the Champs-Élysées. A second prize, called Prix Louis Delluc for first film, went to Valentine Cadic for “Le rendez-vous de l’été,” which is set against the backdrop of the Paris Olympic Games and opened this year at the Berlinale.

“The Little Sister,” which marks the third feature film helmed by Herzi, tells the coming-of-age story about a French-Algerian teenager exploring her sexuality while navigating her Muslim faith. The film was adapted from the novel by Fatima Daas which was brought to Herzi by Julie Billy who produced “The Little Sister” alongside Naomi Denamur through their banner June Films.

Nadia Melliti, who won best actress at Cannes, stars as 17-year-old Fatima, the youngest of three daughters, who grapples with her emerging attraction to women and her loyalty to her caring French-Algerian family.MK2 Films has sold it around the world, including in the U.S. where it was acquired by Strand Releasing. In France, where Ad Vitam is handling “The Little Sister,” the movie has struck a chord, selling more than 400K admissions — a healthy performance in a difficult theatrical market.

Speaking to Variety right after the ceremony, Herzi said receiving the Louis Delluc Prize was a “great source of great pride.”

“I know that these are people who are knowledgeable, who see a lot of films, who are not easily influenced. It’s a very tough jury,” said Herzi, who is also a popular actress who picked up this year’s Cesar Award for her role in “Borgo.”

“In my career as a director,” Herzi said, “the support of the press has been very important, considering the subjects I’m tackling in my films, including in the latest one.”

When Herzi set off to adapt Fatima Daas’ book, she said she “immediately knew it was going to be complicated.” She was also warned. “I was told clearly: Homosexuality, religion, forget it.”

But she boldly pursued the project. “I really wanted to take on the challenge and I believed strongly in the character and the story,” she said, before revealing that the production had to pause and relocate at some point. “During filming, we got into trouble, some people threw stones at part of the crew because they didn’t want a lesbian film, so we had to stop for everyone’s safety,” Herzi said. Once the film was released, she said she also “received quite a few threats and insults.” But while she acknowledged the fact that making the film was “complicated” due to the backlash she had to overcome, she also felt that “received a lot more kindness all around” through the journey.

Billy, who discovered Fatima Daas’s book and thought of Herzi to bring it to the big screen, told Variety that when she first read the novel she “felt it was unadaptable and at the same time, a masterpiece of emotions, led by a character who is truly missing in literature, but also in cinema.”

Having seen Herzi’s debut feature “Tu merites un amour” (“You Deserve a Lover”), Billy felt that Herzi could make it her own if she adapted “The Little Sister.” “In Hafsia’s films, there is life, there is freedom, there is a liveliness in her mise-en-scene that was very similar to the liveliness in Fatima’s language, and I wanted these two to come together.”

In adapting the novel, Herzi “achieved something quite crazy,” Billy said, “because the book is very fragmented, covering many stages of the character’s life, and she made some very strong choices.”

The Louis-Delluc jury is presided by former Cannes president Gilles Jacob, and comprises Sophie Avon Alex Vicente, Ariane Allard, Ava Cahen, Charlotte Lipinska, Élisabeth Franck-Dumas, Jean-Marc Lalanne, Jean-Michel Frodon, Gérard Lefort, Mathieu Macheret, Pierre Murat and Sophie Grassin.