EXCLUSIVE: Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, the French directing duo behind Intouchables, are now filming their ninth feature Just An Illusion, a
EXCLUSIVE: Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, the French directing duo behind Intouchables, are now filming their ninth feature Just An Illusion, a teenage coming-of-age story set in mid-1980s Paris starring Camille Cottin, Louis Garrel and Pierre Lottin.
Gaumont is launching sales in Cannes.
Set in 1985, the film centres on a nearly 13-year-old boy in a middle-class suburb of Paris caught between an older brother who ignores him and his arguing parents, as he fumbles through life’s biggest questions about identity, friendship, family, first crushes, and why adults never seem to have things figured out.
Newcomer Simon Torreton plays the film’s teenage protagonist. “He finds himself caught in the middle, no longer a child, but not yet an adult, a unique moment of separation when you emerge from the sheltered state of childhood to discover certain realities that you had previously been protected from, realities that are both fascinating and unsettling,” said the filmmakers of the character.
Toledano and Nakache described the film as their most personal to date. “It is the result of our profound desire to tell the story of adolescence… It is one of the few moments in life when we live in the present. Just An Illusion is our way of evoking nostalgia for the future, of a time when we looked ahead with a fierce desire to change the world.”
They opted to set the film in the 1980s, “a creative, bustling decade on the verge of the modernity that shapes our lives today, a time of transition, much like adolescence”.
The soundtrack will feature popular tracks from the period, and the film’s title is a reference to British trio Imagination’s hit 1982 song ‘Just An Illusion’.
The film is now shooting in and around Paris. It reteams Intouchables’ Quad Films and the filmmakers’ production company Ten Films which most recently produced environmental crisis comedy drama A Difficult Year that premiered at Toronto 2023. Gaumont will release the film in France on October 14, 2026.
Gaumont’s EVP of international distribution and co-productions Alexis Cassanet called Toledano and Nakache “among the most internationally renowned French filmmakers” and told Screen: “Gaumont is very proud to rely on the trust and loyalty of these directors, whose talent is beyond question. Just An Illusion embodies everything that defines the DNA of Éric and Olivier’s cinema: heartfelt storytelling, a sense of humour, and a universal message.”
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